Company: ZHIHF
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form Type: 20-F
Source: 0001410578-25-000729
Chunk: 36

Company: Zhihu Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form: 20-F
Item: Item 3
Chunk 36
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. Companies in the internet, technology, and media industries own, and are seeking to obtain, a large number of patents, copyrights, trademarks, know-how, and trade secrets, and they are frequently involved in litigation arising from allegations of infringement, misappropriation, or other violations of intellectual property rights. There may be third-party patents issued or pending that cover significant aspects of our technologies, products, or services, and such third parties may attempt to enforce such rights against us. The content in our community may expose us to claims and allegations relating to intellectual property and other causes. Although we have processes and procedures to screen content that is subject to copyright or other intellectual property right claims, we may not be able to identify, remove, or disable all potentially infringing content that may exist. As a result, third parties may act and file claims against us if they believe that certain Zhihu content violates their copyright or other intellectual property rights.

We are presently involved in and expect to continue to be subject to legal or administrative actions for defamation, negligence, copyright and trademark infringement, unfair competition, breach of service terms, or other purported injuries resulting from the Zhihu content and the nature of our services. Such legal and administrative actions, with or without merits, may be expensive and time-consuming, may result in significant diversion of resources and management attention from our business operations, and may adversely affect our brand and reputation. As of the date of this annual report, we are not subject to any material claims or allegations relating to intellectual property that will have material adverse effect to our business operations.

We may not be able to adequately protect our intellectual property rights, and any failure to protect our intellectual property rights from infringement such as unauthorized use of our intellectual properties by third parties and the expenses incurred in protecting our intellectual property rights could materially and adversely affect our business and competitive position.

We rely on a combination of patent, trademark, copyright, domain name, and trade secret protection laws in China and other jurisdictions, as well as confidentiality procedures and other contractual terms to protect our intellectual property rights and brand. Protection of intellectual property rights in China may not be effective in protecting our rights, and, as a result, we may not be able to adequately protect our intellectual property rights, which could materially and adversely affect our business and competitive position. These violations of intellectual property rights, whether or not successfully defended, may also discourage content creation. In addition, any unauthorized use of our intellectual properties by third parties may adversely affect our business and reputation. In particular, our members may abuse