2021 EU-China Forum on Criminal IP Enforcement

01 - 02 Dec 2021

2021 EU-China Forum on Criminal IP Enforcement

By SteinarZ Comments

IP Key China, in partnership with the Quality Brands Protection Committee of China Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment (referred to as QBPC), organised the EU-China Forum on Criminal IP Enforcement on 1-2 December, with the support of the EU Delegation to China, the EU member states, bringing together law-enforcement agencies domestically and internationally, prosecution offices, business, e-commerce platform, industrial associations and other IP stakeholders.

This Forum attracted over 100 participants online and covered a wide range of IP enforcement topics from the international collaboration and exchange on criminal enforcement to the new trends and challenges. Economic elements related to IP crime was discussed. Each panel was accompanied by a Q&A session and a roundtable discussion.

On the first panel of International Collaboration and Exchange on the Criminal Enforcement of IP, the speakers from Chinese law-enforcement agencies illustrated the emerging challenges and problems with cross-border IP crime cases and emphasised the significance of cooperation among different countries, regions and jurisdictions. The speaker of OLAF described the negative impact of counterfeit goods with data, brought up new challenges such as the infiltration of supply chains with counterfeit goods and the complex global trade routes, which required the strengthening of coordination and cooperation of law-enforcement agencies between different regions by facilitating the sharing of quality data, the leads and investigations to foster joint operation.

In the second panel on New Trends and Challenges on the Criminal Enforcement of IP, the speakers from Chinese law-enforcement agencies emphasised the practical problems related to IP crime ranging from meeting the criminal threshold to the difficulties in calculating the illegal gains and looked forward to further specificity in the interpretation of legal terms applicable to the criminal enforcement.  And the speaker of EUCCC illustrated the problems facing the IP right holders and delivered suggestions for the improvement of IP criminal enforcement, for example, the greater allocation of enforcement resources to small and medium sized brands, the greater role of IP right holders in the whole process, the more regular enforcement actions besides the special operations.

In the third panel on Joint Governance and Collaboration among Stakeholders on the Criminal Enforcement of IP, the speakers from Chinese law-enforcement agencies shared the enforcement practices taking into consideration the economic differences among the different regions, enhancing the data-based capabilities and integrating the data-model into the IP crime governance. The speaker of the Bordeaux Wine Council illustrated the first criminal case for EU GI collective trademark in China. This case set a precedent in the criminal prosecution of GI collective trademarks. Some speakers from EU member states also shared their unique practices, for example, the online reporting system for IP right holders to upload IP infringement, the delivery of extensive evidence for authorities to consult etc.

In the last panel on Economic Elements on the Criminal Enforcement of IP, the speakers of the International Federation of Phonographic Industry (IFPI) elaborated on some court decisions of music infringement cases from the fines borne by the counterfeiters to the calculation of the criminal threshold. The speaker of the EU Observatory described the economic factors, including the number of active users, the quantity of counterfeits seized, particularly the proceeds of crime based on the European IP crime cases. Another speaker from the E-business platforms shared the utilization of new technology and artificial intelligence in the eco system of IP protection with data as the cornerstone and demonstrated the positive results of cooperation between law-enforcement agencies and their platform.

During the 2-days event, the joint collaboration and coordination among the stakeholders, in particular between law-enforcement agencies, has been underlined repeatedly. More significantly, each IP stakeholder cannot overlook the fact that, IP infringement is a global challenge which requires a global solution accordingly.

IP Key China is committed to building the EU-China Forum on Criminal IP Enforcement as an open platform for the sharing of professional knowledge and best practices from various IP stakeholders.

Documents:

Agenda

 

For more information, please stay tuned to IP Key China: China | IPKEY

Share this post