05 | 10 | 2018

Studies Published by the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights

Photo: Unsplash.com/Liana Mikah

Please note that there were several new studies published in the past period by the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) through the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights.

The Study on Voluntary Collaboration Practices in Addressing Online Infringements of Trademark Rights, Design Rights, Copyright and Rights Related to Copyright, developed by industry, public bodies and other stakeholders of the protection system, provides an insight into six different kinds of procedures or practices of voluntary collaboration developed and applied in this field in France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria, Great Britain and the United States of America.

In addition, the study with the Feasibility Analysis for an EU Digital Deposit System, examines whether it is legally and technically feasible at EU level to develop a digital platform enabling authors, inventors and other creators and businesses to keep evidence of the existence of their works or other information at a certain point in time through a central tool that operates in a secure and highly confidential manner, administered by a public authority. There was also published the Study on Voluntary Registration and Deposit Systems: United States and China.

Another study, prepared and co-ordinated by the EUIPO and OECD, was published under the title: Why Do Countries Export Fakes, seeking to answer the question of why some countries or economies are more involved trade in counterfeit goods than others, and which main socio-economic drivers are factors that have influence thereon.

Then, there follow two studies related to the field of justice – the study titled Specialised IP Rights Jurisdictions in Member States and the study that represents the basic determinant for court disputes concerning trade secrets in the European Union, titled The Baseline of Trade Secrets Litigation in the EU Member States, providing a description of basic characteristics of legal systems in all of the 28 EU Member States in the field of protection against unlawful acquisition, use or disclosure of trade secrets.

The Study on Legislative Measures Related to Online IPR Infringements provides an insight into whether and to what extent a number of specific legislative measures, which can be applied to prevent or combat IPR infringement in the online environment, are available in the EU Member States. The study is based on the questionnaires addressing civil legislative and criminal legislative measures.

The last study in a row was published under the title: Identification and Analysis of Malware on Selected Suspected Copyright-Infringing Websites, providing an overview of the most up-to-date examples of malware and potentially unwanted programmes found on such websites. The research was carried out in cooperation with the European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) at Europol.

All the aforementioned studies can be accessed at the link, and abstracts of some of the studies are available in Croatian as well.