“Gu Ailing” trademark is registered lawyer: malicious cybersquatting is not protected
2022-02-11 10:04:43Source: Beijing Youth Daily
“Gu Ailing” trademark is registered lawyer: malicious cybersquatting is not protected
Intellectual Property Office: Cybersquatting of public figures is malicious registration
On February 8, Chinese athlete Gu Ailing won the championship in the women’s freestyle ski jumping final at the Beijing Winter Olympics, which attracted great attention. Later, some netizens discovered that the three words “Gu Ailing” were registered as a trademark as early as June 10, 2019, just like Quan Hongchan’s name was squatted. Industry insiders in the field of intellectual property said that if the malicious registration of trademarks such as “near famous brand” and “hot spot” is determined to be malicious registration, it will be dealt with by legal means. At present, the applicant will not be punished, but it may be punished. agency.
Find
“Gu Ailing” trademark
29 pieces of application information
The Qichacha App shows that there are 29 trademark applications for “Gu Ailing”. Among them, 11 “Gu Ailing” trademarks applied by a natural person Zhang on June 10, 2019 have been registered, and the international classification involves education, education and entertainment, advertising sales, lamps and air conditioners, etc. The trademark “Gu Ailing” applied for by other companies and natural persons is displayed as “application for registration” or “invalid trademark”.
Some netizens posted that on June 6, 2019, Gu Ailing announced that she would go to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. Four days later, her name was squatted with a number of trademarks. The subjective malignancy and speculative psychology of trademark applicants are more obvious. At the same time, the three characters “Gu Ailing” have no specific meaning in Chinese. The applicant and the registered trademark are not related, and there are reasons to suspect that it is a famous brand and a squatting trademark.
Regulation
Cybersquatting public figures
malicious registration
According to the answers to key questions in the “Guidelines for Trademark Examination and Trial” published on the official website of the Intellectual Property Office, there is no definition of “bad faith” in the legal provisions of my country’s “Trademark Law”. Article 4, Article 7, Article 15, Article 19, Article 32, Article 44, etc. However, it is generally believed that malicious registration of trademarks can be roughly divided into two types according to the interests infringed. The trademark registration application behavior with the core characteristics of clinging to others’ goodwill, civil rights and legitimate rights and interests; the other type is the behavior of “bad faith application for trademark registration not for the purpose of use”, that is, “batch application” and “occupation of resources” to disrupt or The trademark registration application behavior with the core feature of impacting the trademark registration and management order.
Article 32 of the “Trademark Law” stipulates that an application for trademark registration shall not damage the existing prior rights of others, and shall not preemptively register a trademark that has been used by others and has certain influence by improper means. The Guidelines for Trademark Examination and Trial further stipulate that prior rights include name rights, portrait rights, copyrights and other prior rights that should be protected.
Song Linqing, a partner of Beijing Runjie Zhicheng Intellectual Property Agency, said in an interview with a reporter from Beiqing Daily that acts that violate the principle of good faith, maliciously register trademarks, and use judicial resources to seek illegitimate interests with trademark rights will not be protected in accordance with the law. . According to the provisions of Article 4 of the Trademark Law, a malicious trademark registration application that is not intended for use shall be rejected.
Since Gu Ailing was only relatively well-known in the field of skiing in 2019, there may be trademark examiners who did not understand this situation, so the application for registration was successful. But now, anyone who wants to register the “Gu Ailing” trademark will definitely be rejected. Song Linqing explained that for “Gu Ailing”, which was registered as a trademark as early as June 2019, it will be declared invalid according to the invalidation procedure.
In response to the question of whether the applicant will be punished, Song Linqing explained that the current trademark law does not involve penalties for individual registration, but the agency will be punished. According to Article 19 of the Trademark Law, relevant agencies can be punished.
action
482,000 hits last year
Bad faith trademark registration application
my country has been committed to cracking down on malicious trademark registration applications. From March 2021, the State Intellectual Property Office will focus on a special campaign against malicious squatting of trademarks, and severely crack down on 7 types of malicious squatting that seeks improper interests, disrupts the order of trademark registration management, and causes greater adverse social impact. The category is “Malicious cybersquatting of the names of public figures, well-known works or characters with high reputation”.
On August 19, 2021, the State Intellectual Property Office issued the “Regarding the Rejection of “Yang Qian” and “Chen Meng” in accordance with the law in response to the trademark registration applications submitted by multiple parties for the names of Olympic athletes such as “Yang Qian”, “Chen Meng” and “Quan Hongchan”. “Notice of 109 trademark registration applications including “Quanhongchan”, and 109 related trademark registration applications such as “Yang Qian”, “Chen Meng” and “Quanhongchan” were rejected in accordance with the law.
On January 12, 2022, at the 2021 IP-related work statistical data conference held by the State Council Information Office, Zhang Zhicheng, director of the Intellectual Property Protection Department of the State Intellectual Property Office, said that a total of 482,000 malicious trademark registration applications were cracked down throughout the year. At the same time, last year, 1,111 trademark registration applications such as “Changjin Lake” and “Quanhongchan” were quickly rejected, 1,635 registered trademarks were declared invalid ex officio, and 1,062 clues were sent to local governments for suspected major adverse effects and malicious trademark registration cases. A high-pressure situation has been created in the whole society to crack down on malicious trademark registration.
Zhang Zhicheng said that the State Intellectual Property Office has also stepped up efforts to crack down on malicious squatting by trademark agencies. Organized local intellectual property management departments to file and investigate 24 trademark agency cases involving squatting of Olympic Games hot word trademarks, and imposed administrative penalties on 13 cases. For the two trademark agencies that acted for major malicious squatting cases with serious violations of the law, administrative penalties were directly imposed and their trademark agency business was suspended. Interviewed and managed 13 platform-based trademark agencies, and guided them to establish and improve the screening mechanism for malicious squatting of trademarks, and prevent malicious squatting of trademarks and other violations of laws and regulations. (Reporter Lin Lishuang)