Category Trademarks/Geographical Indications/Domains

Trademark Owners Take On Internet Search Engines

By Liza Porteus for Intellectual Property Watch
NEW YORK - Popular search engines like Google are proving to be formidable foes to trademark holders trying to maintain a strong grip on their property in keyword advertising on the Internet, experts said on 10 September.

There are numerous search engines people can use to look up information online, but Google is not only the most popular, it is also involved in a litany of lawsuits involving online ads and trademarks. So far, Google has prevailed in US courts, but has lost similar trademark cases in France.

IP Expertise Of Senior USPTO Official Challenged

By Steven Seidenberg for Intellectual Property Watch Amid complaints over patent quality and a rising backlog of applications at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the agency has been hit with a lawsuit alleging that its deputy director…

US Ruling Creates Uncertainty For Famous Foreign Trademarks

By Steve Seidenberg for Intellectual Property Watch
In a ruling that surprised many trademark experts in the United States, one of the country's most respected appellate courts recently cut back on the protection given to famous foreign trademarks. If such marks are well known in the US but are not registered or used in the country, they are unprotected by federal law, according to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

The WIPO View On Enforcement, Idris And Development Agenda

Wolfgang Starein is the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) official with primary responsibility for enforcement of intellectual property rights. In a series of recent interviews with Intellectual Property Watch, Starein talked about WIPO’s enforcement agenda for the coming year, a…

Industry: Criminal Checks Needed For Tasting, Kiting, Spying

By Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch International organisations should step in to prevent the “tasting,” “kiting” and “spying” related to Internet domain names, say representatives from the US telecommunications and trademark industries. These new activities are dramatically altering online…