Chinanews.com, April 25th. He Zhimin, deputy director of the State Intellectual Property Office, stated on the 25th that the State Intellectual Property Office resolutely opposed and promptly cracked down on malicious registration of trademarks. From 2018 to 2020, the cumulative number of applications for malicious squatting and hoarding of trademark registration has been rejected. 150,000 pieces.
On the 25th, the State Council Information Office held a press conference on the implementation of the "14th Five-Year Plan" outline and speeding up the construction of a country with intellectual property rights.
At the meeting, a reporter asked questions that the phenomenon of trademark squatting such as celebrity names and well-known companies has attracted great public attention.
May I ask, what specific measures are in place to crack down on malicious trademark registration?
What are the next steps?
He Zhimin said that the State Intellectual Property Office resolutely opposed and promptly cracked down on malicious trademark registration, and actively guided the whole society to establish a correct awareness of trademark registration.
According to He Zhimin, according to the provisions of the Trademark Law, malicious registration of trademarks mainly refers to trademark registration activities that violate the principle of good faith and use the reputation of others in the market, damage the legitimate rights and interests of others, or infringe on public resources.
It mainly includes two situations: one is the malicious squatting of trademarks, which is mainly "near famous brands" and "hot spots" and the squatting of the names of major national projects and public figures; the other is the malicious hoarding of trademarks, which means "no need “Hoard first” means a large amount of trademarks that are not used for the purpose of hoarding.
"Both of these two acts have great social harm. The malicious squatting of trademarks, such as the well-known trademark'Ding Zhen' being squatted, is that someone seeks improper interests, thereby disrupting the order of trademark registration management and causing adverse social impacts. The malicious hoarding of trademarks, such as the more than 300 trademark registration applications of a company rejected by our office some time ago, is a waste of market and administrative resources and seriously harms public interests." He Zhimin said.
He Zhimin pointed out that in order to effectively deal with these problems and actively create a better market environment, the State Intellectual Property Office has done four aspects of work:
One is to promote the improvement of laws and regulations.
The fourth revision of the Trademark Law specifically added a provision that "malicious trademark registration applications not for the purpose of use should be rejected", and moved the threshold of combating malicious hoarding of trademark applications to the review stage, and throughout the entire trademark application registration process .
The second is to accurately identify.
Through the establishment of a lexicon of trademark review guidelines and comprehensive manual judgment, the malicious registration of trademarks can be accurately identified during the review.
The third is to carry out classified disposal.
For those that have major adverse social impacts, such as malicious squatting of trademarks such as "Leishenshan" and "Clear Love", they will be quickly rejected and exposed, so that relevant institutions and personnel will be condemned by the whole society.
"From 2018 to 2020, we have rejected more than 150,000 malicious registration and hoarding trademark registration applications."
The fourth is to organize special strikes.
In last year's "Blue Sky" special rectification operation, 2,950 agencies were interviewed in various places.
Last month, the State Intellectual Property Office launched a special campaign to focus on combating malicious squatting of trademarks, urging local law enforcement agencies to further increase their crackdowns and forming a high-pressure deterrent.
He Zhimin said that in the next step, the State Intellectual Property Office will continue to improve the trademark legal system, increase containment and penalties, expose typical cases in a timely manner, promote the construction of Chinese brands, and continue to promote the high-quality development of intellectual property.