2021 EU-China Conference on IPR Protection Online & Innovation

IP Key China and Beijing Anti-infringement and Anti-counterfeiting Alliance (CAASA) organised the 2021 EU-China Conference on IPR Protection Online & Innovation on 9 December 2021, with the support of the EU Delegation to China, bringing together the EU and Chinese government agencies, international organisations, E-commerce platforms, social media platforms, live-streaming platforms, express delivery service providers, law firms and multinational enterprises.  

The speakers and participants online and offline exchanged views, ideas, and practices around the topics of online IP protection, new forms of e-commerce, the industry focus: cosmetics and public health, the role of intermediaries: logistics and express delivery. Each panel was accompanied by the Q/A session.

During the event, IP Key China study team issued the report on the New Development of Online Counterfeiting and Piracy in China (referred to as the Study) from the perspectives of legislation, cases and practice. The Study introduced the legislative and regulatory development on the IP protection in the E-commerce and proposed areas of improvement for the E-commerce platforms, for example, by building more visible and transparent access channels for the right holders to join IP protection initiatives, to ensure the sufficient manpower to the review the contents, etc.

The speakers of the E-commerce platforms and social media platforms illustrated their unique online IP protection system and risk control measures taking advantage of the big data and leading-edge technologies, which was consistent with the observation of the Study that the major e-commerce platform continued to bring the innovative and proactive measures to tackle online counterfeiting and piracy. Some EU of law firms described the IP challenges faced by EU companies in China, such as the fact of being not familiar with the Chinese legal system, the inconsistence between the EU and China IP system, etc.

The Chinese Customs introduced the legislative progress for Customs IP protection and special actions and encouraged the right holders to use the Customs IP system including the IP recordation and IP infringement reporting platform. And a local market regulation agency showed how the local regulations on the E-commerce platforms protect the intellectual property indirectly.

There were also new topics and new industries this year. The speaker of the HADOPI demonstrated the France’s approach to combat internet piracy from a set of complementary rules to strong regulation, from the coordination with the internet intermediaries to the tools that make the end users accountable. And the speaker from DHL gave their views from the angle of compliance and commitment, emphasizing the importance of the role played by the express courier that is placed at the last stage of supply chain with regards to infringing goods.

Ms. Helene JURAMY, from the Trade Section at the EU Delegation to China, referred to the improvement of China’s IP system and called for non-discriminatory implementation of the IP rules and uniformity of enforcement throughout China. The EU-China cooperation on the intellectual property protection, especially with the e-commerce platforms was mentioned to tackle sophisticated IP infringement networks and massive counterfeiting capabilities of infringers.

IP Key China, an EU-funded project, has been committed to organizing this event as an open and efficient platform that enables the IP stakeholders to facilitate exchanges and practices between the EU and China on tackling the online sales of counterfeited goods.

Agenda:

• Response to Online Counterfeiting and Piracy Seminar Agenda [PDF - 0.78 MB] [EN / CN]

Documents:

1. Misuse of online commerce in the global trade of counterfeits [PDF - 0.76 MB] [EN]
2. Punitive damages for IP infringement in the new e-commerce context [PDF - 0.95MB] [EN]
3. France's approach to combating internet piracy of copyright [PDF - 1.84MB] [EN]
4. Online IP enforcement and developments in China from an EU perspective [PDF - 0.59MB] [EN]
5. New Development of Online Counterfeiting and Piracy in China Legislation, Cases and Practice Study [PDF - 1.4MB] [EN]
6. IP protection while contracting with intermediaries [PDF - 0.33MB] [EN]
7. DHL express customs compliance [PDF - 0.9 MB] [EN]

Links:

1. Study on the New Development of Online Counterfeiting and Piracy in China
2. Memorandum of Understanding on the Sale of Counterfeit Goods on the Internet
3. Making the Most of the EU’s Innovative Potential – An Intellectual Property Action Plan to Support the EU’s Recovery and Resilience