Protecting Rights Holders Since 1979
Law enforcement agencies around the globe conduct counterfeit website “takedown raids” throughout the year. Participation in these law enforcement operations is free to SMEs but it does require close coordination with the law enforcement agencies. The major benefit to SMEs is that companies can leave the burden and costs of takedown activities to law enforcement agencies saving SMEs money and time. Brand protection service providers can help businesses follow these operations and submit the information needed to remove websites selling counterfeits. Below are the some of the key operations in which SMEs can participate:
Information below provided by Heng Li, Counsel and Senior Analyst at IACC. She is licensed to practice in the State of New York. Heng previously worked as a trademark attorney for a law firm in Beijing, China.
Copyright is an automatic right, meaning that the author enjoys the copyright as soon as the original work is created and fixed in a tangible form of expression. Unlike trademark and patent, which are territorial IP rights, copyright of a foreigner is also automatically protected in China through the Berne Convention, provided that the author is from a member state of the Berne Convention.
China implements a “voluntary copyright registration” principle, and generally, you do not need to register your copyright to enforce it in China. However, it is advisable to obtain a registration certificate for your copyright. When it comes to a copyright dispute or in the event of an infringement, the copyright registration will serve as prima facie evidence of ownership and alleviate your burden of proof, though this evidence can be challenged by counter-evidence.
With or without copyright registration, it is always important to keep the files and records of your creation of the works.
A copyright notice is a notice placed on a work to inform the public the work is protected by copyright law, the copyright owner of the work, and the year of the work’s first publication (if published).
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