Customs Import or Export Suspension Procedures～ Effective and efficient anti-counterfeiting and piracy measures～
Customs import suspension procedure is a system whereby the holder of a patentright, utility model right, design right, trademark right, copyright, neighboring rights, orbreeder's right, or the claimant of an unfair competition injunction, requests the customs
director to suspend importation of goods that are found to infringe their rights and toinitiate a verification procedure of them.

[Source: Press release issued by the Ministry of Finance on September 10, 2021]

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1. Three advantages of import suspension of infringing goods at customs1）Stop infringing goods before they spread
Once infringing goods from abroad enter the country, it takes a great deal of time,effort, and expense to investigate and stop advertisement or sales. In particular, whenitems are sold on auction sites on the internet, even if they are removed from theauction site by sending a warning letter or requesting removal, they may soon be soldon another auction site, and the right holder and the infringer may play a cat-and-mousegame. However, if the importation can be stopped by customs, the spread of infringing
goods can be stopped because they will not enter Japan. Furthermore, since Customs
publishes the status of receipt and acceptance of suspension applications on its website
and information is exchanged among importers, it can be expected to deter not only
importers of the infringing goods in question, but also potential importer of infringing
goods.
In order to constitute trademark infringement or design infringement, it wasnecessary to import the infringing goods “in the course of business”.
However, under the revised Trademark Act and Design Act of 2021, the act of“import” now includes “the act of a person in a foreign country causing another personto bring into Japan from a foreign country” (Article 4, Section 7 of the new Trademark
Act and Article 2 Section 2 paragraph 1 of the new Design Act), which allows for
suspension at Customs, even if the person importing the goods is doing so for personaluse.

2) Information on importers etc. can be obtained from Customs
In the course of the Customs import suspension procedure, the address(location) and name (company name) of the importer and exporter of theinfringing goods are known by a notification from Customs. The importer’s
information is very useful in order to take further action, such as sending awarning letter or other contact, and possibly filing a lawsuit.
3) Customs offices across the country deal with a suspension
When filing a lawsuit to seek an injunction, it is necessary to file a lawsuit foreach individual case, which is costly and time-consuming, and there is also theissue of jurisdiction of the court. On the other hand, if a petition for Customssuspension is filed, the infringing goods will be enjoined at all Customs offices
nationwide (Hakodate Customs, Tokyo Customs, Yokohama Customs, OsakaCustoms, Nagoya Customs, Kobe Customs, Moji Customs, and Nagasaki
Customs as major Customs offices). Therefore, it can be said that the time period
is shorter and than litigation and the cost is lower. It is also a very efficientmeasure against infringing goods since the customs injunction procedure covers
not only ship cargo but also cargo imported by air.

2. Our experience
Our firm represents clients in petitions for suspension based on trademark
infringement, copyright infringement, and design infringement. We havefrequently received reports of suspensions granted by customs, and we haveseen a high degree of effectiveness. Specifically, in one year, we executed
approximately 80 suspension proceedings of more than 20,000 goods. Moreover,in cases where the number of infringing goods imported is extremely large, thefrequency of imports is high, or sales do not stop even after a warning letter issent, we have handled such cases as a criminal case, which have even resulted
in prosecution and conviction.
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Attorney at Law

Reiko TONOMURA
Attorney at Law

Katsuomi ISOGAI
Patent Attorney[k_iida☆nakapat.gr.jp][r_tonomura☆nakapat.gr.jp][t_ishido☆nakapat.gr.jp]

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