hearing of the subcommittee on intellectual property competition in the internet will come to order and i'll recognize myself for an opening statement companies that rely upon strong intellectual property protection employ eighteen million americans account for more than fifty percent of our exports contribute forty percent of our economic growth and six percent of our gross domestic product given these numbers is apparent that our continued ability to promote creativity innovation and protect american intellectual property law at the center of vital u s economic and national security interests but how serious are the challenges to u s ip leadership what should be our priorities and what are the appropriate roles of the public and private sectors in preserving our competitive advantages and protecting intellectual property i'd like to note the intelligence community's analysis of one of the evolving threats posed by ip theft earlier this month the director of national intelligence stated that in our interdependent world economic challenges have become paramount and cannot be underestimated from increasing debt to fluctuating growth to china's economic and military rise he went on to say we're seeing a rise in intellectual property theft industry has estimated the loss of intellectual property worldwide to cyber crime in two thousand and eight alone cost businesses approximately one trillion dollars we believe this trend has gotten worse last year some of our largest information technology companies discovered that throughout much of two thousand and nine they've been the targets of systematic efforts to penetrate their networks and acquire proprietary data the intrusions attempted to gain access to repast tori's of source code the underlying software that comprises the intellectual crown jewels of many of these companies similar findings were included in the intelligence community's two thousand and eleven annual threat assessment it is clear that the challenges faced by ip holders are serious and that protecting intellectual property has important implications for our nation's economy innovation and national security the us government clearly has both strategic and practical interest in ensuring our nation's ip laws foster the continued development of innovative and creative products here at home we also have obligations to ensure our laws are administered efficiently and enforced appropriately in recognition of the need to elevate ip enforcement policy on the permanent list  government priorities congress passed the prioritizing resources and organization for intellectual property act of two thousand and eight or pro ip signed into law by president george w bush on october thirteenth two thousand and eight the effort to enact pro ip was led by our then chairman and current chairman and current ranking member representative john conyers jr and representative lamar smith respectively the law followed on precedent efforts by the bush administration to implement new strategies to assist ip owners and improve ip enforcement at home and abroad these included this strategy targeting organized piracy or stop and the formation of the department of justice first intellectual property task force a key provision of pro ip is the requirement to establish the intellectual property in forstmann coordinator position or i p e c in the executive office of the president congress determined this was needed to make certain the official charged with coordinating ip enforcement policy across all agencies had the requisite authority and independence to transcend agency boundaries in september of two thousand and nine president barack obama nominated victoria espen now the former assistant u s trade representative for intellect property and innovation as the first c she was confirmed in december two thousand and nine since assuming office ms s canal has been responsible for fulfilling the statutory duty specified in section three a one beat of the pro i and ten the office of the i p e c published the inaugural joint strategic plan on intellectual property enforcement which identified thirty three in forstmann strategy action items the federal government will take to enhance the protection of american intellectual property rights several are of specific interest to the subcommittee these include efforts to combat the theft of intellectual property online and increase information sharing between law  and rights holders in february the office published its first annual report on ip enforcement and the president appointed the i p e c to chair two new ip enforcement advisory committees in addition the office reports substantial progress on developing a white paper that will contain specific statutory recommendations for improving federal intellectual property laws and enforcement efforts i'm told one or two issues need to be finalized but i'm hopeful that members of the sub committee they receive a brief overview of what is expected as you can see we have a lot to talk about today especially at a time when the subcommittee is about to undertake hearings examining the ever growing problem of online piracy and rogue websites both here in the u s and overseas ms s but now has assumed her duties at a historic and critical time today's hearing which represents the first formal oversight hearing of the office for the we'll examine the work of the office since it was established in two thousand and eight i look forward to hearing about the progress of the office as well as new ideas the office has for further protecting the intellectual property  goodlatte and also a co sponsor of the bill which was signed into law october thirteenth two thousand and eight the fall of countless studies that demonstrated the reliance of u s businesses an entrepreneurs own intellectual property rights to protect them vestments resources and creativity that in turn feed and grow the u s economy patents trademarks and copyrights are the backbone of many american enterprises and virtually all innovation however we found that increasing both within and beyond the u s borders cost american jobs and often also threatens public health and safety also recognize that there were major challenges in coordinating federal enforcement of existing laws in support of intellectual property rights numerous agencies shared responsibility for ant addiction investigation and prosecution of intellectual property offices to address on its system of enforcement created the position of the intellectual property enforcement coordinator and require that it be house in the executive office of the president today we welcome victoria esben alle the intellectual property enforcement coordinator to this inaugural oversight hearing of  the in the house to tell us what progress has been made since her position was created this will be our first opportunity of the present state of the union and subsequent issuance of the executive order designating the strengthened federal effort to encourage innovation through vigorous enforcement of don't lecture a property law to hear an administration official on the implementation of concrete steps to ramp up our  enforcement regime so i look forward to hearing from our witness and you'll back the balance and i thank the gentleman it's my understanding that the ranking member the full committee the gentleman from michigan mr conyers also has a statement and i