Source: https://theipexporter.com/category/tarnishment/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 18:34:15+00:00

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Today I had the privilege to provide a guest contribution to one of my favorite intellectual property blogs, The IPKat, on a story about the Canadian Olympic Committee’s unfair competition dispute with the The North Face over the U.S. clothing company’s International Collection. Check it out at http://ipkitten.blogspot.com/2014/01/friday-fantasies_24.html.
Although Sears Canada’s comments are by no means unique for a defendant in such a trademark lawsuit, the reporting of the comments in several news outlets has significant public relations (PR) implications. By claiming that Canada Goose is using trademark laws to bully retailers and control prices, Sears’ comments inevitably impact the ways retailers and the general public perceive Canada Goose and its parka jackets. Negative public perceptions about a business’ IP enforcement actions can tarnish a business’ brand and hinder its domestic and foreign market opportunities—just like the counterfeit goods that it tries to protect itself against.
As I read multiple stories about Sears’ comments, I could not help but to think that Canada Goose did not effectively counter Sears’ accusations in the public forum. Many major international clothing manufacturers such as Gucci and Burberry pursue similarly proactive cross-border trademark enforcement strategies as Canada Goose. Yet, few of the reporting news outlets carried the comments of Canada Goose’s spokespersons who gave justifications for the lawsuit against Sears Canada. In fairness, claims of bullying are likely more sensational than justifications for brand protection. However, emerging global companies like Canada Goose must ensure that they effectively communicate to the public the justifications behind their IP enforcement actions. As growing businesses set their sights on international expansion, PR becomes nearly as valuable as trademark protection to ensure that they can take advantage of domestic and foreign market opportunities.
What’s The Takeaway? Businesses who seek legal protections for their brands need to consider the PR implications of their enforcement actions. This is even more important in an international context. As many countries and cultures have negative perceptions towards litigation, businesses need their legal counsel and public relations professionals to collaborate to ensure that the public is educated about their global IP enforcement activities. Doing so can help to prevent the unintended PR consequences that global IP enforcement can bring.
What PR issues does your business face in international IP enforcement?
Last week, I had the privilege of being a guest writer for Seattle-area based Efinitytech on an article dealing with infringing online advertisements. Although it was focused on combatting trademark infringing online advertising on U.S.-based search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo!, as well as U.S. social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, it contained many of the same considerations trademark owners, and their agents, should consider when combatting infringing online advertisements abroad. However, there are a few additional foreign issues trademark rights holders should consider.
1. Obtain A Trademark Registration. U.S. businesses generally need a U.S. federal trademark registration to submit an advertising complaint to a U.S. online advertising website. A U.S. federal trademark registration establishes a presumption of ownership and exclusive rights in a trademark in the U.S. This gives U.S. search engines and social media sites assurances that a filed advertising complaint is valid.
Additional Foreign Considerations: A trademark registration is also generally required to submit ad complaints in other countries. Many countries do not even recognize a business’ rights in a trademark unless it has registered the mark with the country’s national trademark office. As a result, Google, Bing and Yahoo!, their foreign subsidiaries, as well as many other foreign advertising sites, require that a business have a valid trademark registration in the country where they are filing an online ad complaint. This means that if a rights holder wants to enforce their trademark rights against a foreign ad, they generally have to have a valid trademark registration in that foreign country.
2. Advertising Websites Have Different Trademark Enforcement Reputations. U.S. search engines and social media sites have their own track records for responding to advertising complaints. For example, Bing and Yahoo!’s U.S. sites will often remove an infringing ad upon evidence of a valid U.S. federal trademark registration, while Google U.S.’ site generally declines removing ads infringing a descriptive trademark, even if the mark is federally registered through acquired distinctiveness (aka secondary meaning).
Additional Foreign Considerations: The varied reputations of online advertising sites’ handling of trademark ad complaints are even more disparate at the global level. Many foreign sites have good track records, while others less so. Also, some foreign advertising sites have ad enforcement features that offer benefits beyond those offered on most U.S. websites. For example, China’s leading search engine, Baidu, allows trademark rights holders to register their Chinese registered marks with their representatives in order to prevent others from purchasing infringing ads and ad words on their website. However, like Google, Baidu’s IP enforcement system is imperfect, as it has been criticized in the past for failing to stop the sale of ad words to fraudulent advertisers.
3. Multiple Ad Complaints May Need To Be Filed. Trademark rights holders may need to submit multiple complaints against an infringer before an infringer’s ad appears removed. This can be due to the ineffectiveness of an advertising website complaint system, or more likely because an infringing advertiser has made several ad purchases, requiring the submission of multiple ad complaints in order to effectively remove all of an infringer’s advertisements.
Additional Foreign Considerations: None. Additional complaints may need to be filed for foreign trademark ad complaints as well.
4. Consider The Ramifications Of Filing An Online Complaint. Lastly, submitting an online ad complaint may impact an infringing advertiser’s online reputation as well as the trademark rights holder. Based on these ramifications, trademark rights holders should consider reaching out to alleged infringers, either directly or through an attorney, to see if the disputed ad can be removed amicably.
Additional Foreign Considerations: The consequences of filing online trademark ad complaints abroad is as significant, or even more so, then doing so in the U.S. As I have previously highlighted, countries maintain different beliefs and perceptions towards the legal rights that should be given to trademarks and other forms of IP. In particular, several important and emerging foreign markets such as Canada, Chile and New Zealand disagree with forceful online IP enforcement, as seen in their current rejection of copyright website takedowns. This means that submitting online trademark ad complaints may have similar or even more negative reactions in a business’ particular industry (and among the public) abroad than at home. Based on these circumstances, businesses should feel even more inclined to first reach out to foreign infringing advertisers before they submit online ad complaints.
What’s The Takeaway? As combatting infringing online advertisements has many of the same challenges and considerations in the U.S. as abroad, businesses wishing to protect their brands abroad need to identify the countries where they have or may have significant business and develop strategies to protect against online ad infringement. This requires considering foreign trademark registration, identifying major foreign online advertising websites, and developing processes and procedures to monitor and enforce rights against infringing advertising activity on such websites. Doing so can help businesses to more effectively protect their brands in the foreign markets they wish to grow.
Written by lsmichels Leave a comment Posted in Canada, Chile, China, Copyrights, Counterfeit, DMCA, Enforcement, New Zealand, Tarnishment, Trademarks	Tagged with #ad, #advertising, #baidu, #bing, #Chile, #complaint, #crossborder, #dmca, #facebook, #google, #takedown, #twitter, China, copyright, trademark, trademark registration, trademark rights, yahoo!
Earlier this summer, several news outlets reported that U.S. fast food conglomerate Yum! Brands, the operator of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC), was considering taking legal action against a fast food restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand shockingly called “Hitler.” The Hitler restaurant was selling fast food under a logo similar to KFC’s iconic logo, replacing the face of Colonel Harland Sanders, KFC’s founder with his signature white suit and string tie, with the face of Adolph Hitler, former German Chancellor, warmonger and mass-murderer.
Despite the Hitler restaurant’s subsequent removal of their offensive interpretation of the KFC logo, the incident highlighted legal issues businesses may face in foreign markets beyond the unauthorized use of their marks (aka infringement). I’m talking about foreign trademark tarnishment. Trademark tarnishment is the unauthorized use of a well-known mark that degrades consumers’ positive associations with such mark, thereby harming the mark’s overall reputation.
What does this mean in an international context? Foreign trademark tarnishment can result in reduced foreign demand for a business’ goods or services, and hinder their ability to take advantage of foreign market opportunities. Although protecting against trademark tarnishment is generally difficult, KFC’s recent altercation with the Hitler restaurant shows ways in which foreign businesses can take advantage of foreign national trademark laws to protect their marks against tarnishment—even if such countries do not main specific protections against tarnishment.
Thai trademark law does not providing express protections against tarnishment. However, KFC’s logo likely qualifies for tarnishment-like protections in Thailand because it would qualify as a “well-known mark.” Unlike the U.S. and other common law countries (Australia, Canada, India, South Africa and the United Kingdom, among others), Thailand is a “first to file” country, meaning that a mark can normally only obtain full protection under Thai law through registration with the Thai Department of Intellectual Property (DIP). However, Section 8(10) of the Thai Trademark Act (“Act”) acknowledges rights for unregistered well-known marks. Since 2005, an unregistered mark can be designated as a well-known mark under Thai trademark law if it meets several evidentiary criteria upon petition to the DIP’s Board of Well-Known Marks.
Similar to most countries, meeting such criteria in Thailand generally requires that a mark possess nationwide recognition. Article 16(2) of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) and Article 16bis of the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property require that a mark have nationwide recognition among consumers to qualify as a well-known mark. Likewise, Thailand requires that a mark have nationwide consumer recognition, yet this recognition can be established through predominant use of the mark abroad. Once established, a well-known mark is granted protections in all classes of goods and services.
In the case of KFC, it is likely that their logo qualifies as a well-known mark in Thailand based on KFC’s global and national recognition. KFC has more than 450 outlets in Thailand and approximately 15,000 outlets worldwide—not to mention extensive global advertising and promotional campaigns. These facts likely qualify the KFC logo for well-known mark protection in Thailand (upon petition), giving KFC broad protection under the Act for its logo among multiple if not all classes of goods and services.
By obtaining trademark protection, a trademark owner can normally prevent others from most forms of unauthorized use of such mark. Yet, you might asking yourself, o.k., while supplanting Adolf Hitler for Colonel Sanders is detestable, isn’t it permitted as free speech? The answer varies from country-to-country and from case-to-case. Several major markets including the U.S., the European Union and India, recognize that unauthorized users of a mark may defend against infringement or tarnishment claims through fair use, namely the ability to use a registered mark for legitimate free speech purposes such as parody. In the U.S., such a defense is upheld sometimes in a confusing way. For example, a U.S. Court found that the unauthorized noncommercial use of marks from a L.L. Bean catalogue can be parodied in an adult magazine, but the unauthorized use of the Dallas Cowboys football cheerleading team’s trademark in a pornographic film did not. In terms of Nazis and terrorists, a U.S. Court did allow an unauthorized user to conjure up Nazi and Al-Qaeda themes in their use of Wal-Mart’s well-known mark when such use was non-commercial.
Fortunately for KFC, Thailand does not appear to afford such a fair use defense. Section 109 of the Act prohibits any person who “imitates” a registered mark to mislead the public as to its true ownership, subjecting such user to fines up to 200,000 Baht (approx. US$ 6,250.00) and/or two years imprisonment. Due to the inherent broadness of “imitates” without any express fair use defenses provided under the Act, Thailand appears to possess little to no trademark fair use exceptions for parody or other recognized fair uses. Based on these facts, KFC would likely be able to seek enforcement of their trademark rights in their logo as a well-known mark against the Hitler restaurant.
What’s the takeaway? The moral of this story is that understanding foreign national IP laws can help businesses to find effective solutions to protect against tarnishment and other unauthorized uses abroad, even if such protections are not expressly provided in foreign national legislation. Although few business maintain as well-known marks as KFC’s logo, most businesses can adopt tailored foreign trademark protection strategies to prevent tarnishment or infringement of their marks. Businesses who have tarnishment issues in a particular market should consult with qualified local counsel to understand what protections can be afforded to their marks.
 Britt N. Lovejoy, Tarnishing The Dilution by Tarnishment Cause of Action: Starbucks Corp. v. Wolfe’s Borough Coffee, Inc. and V Secret Catalogue, Inc. v. Moseley, Compared, 26 Berkeley Tech. L. J. 623, 626 (2011) (citing J. Thomas McCarthy, 4 McCarthy On Trademarks & Unfair Competition § 24:89 (4th ed.)).
 See Somboon Earterasarun, Criteria In Determining Well-Known Trademarks in Thailand, Tilleke & Gibbins, (2010), available at http://www.tilleke.com/sites/default/files/2010-AsiaIP-Criteria-Well-Known-TM_0.pdf.
 See Keola R. Whittaker, Trademark Dilution in a Global Age, 27 U. Pa. J. Int’l Econ. L. 907, 937 (2006).
 Department of Intellectual Property Regulations on Recordal of Well-Known Marks B.E. 2548 (AD 2005), Ch. 7, 11.
 Say Sujintaya and Jomjai Jintasuwon, Well-known Trademarks in Thailand – A Bump in the Road, Baker & McKenzie, Mar. 23, 2012, available at http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=ce280c13-d28e-45f6-8a45-e45a9af8a74e.
 About KFC, KFC.com, available at www.kfc.com/about; Yum! Brands, Yum! Financial Data, Restaurant Counts (2012), available at http://yum.com/investors/restcounts.asp.
 See L.L. Bean, Inc. v. Drake Publishers, Inc., 811 F.2d 26, 34 (1st. Cir. 1987); compare Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Inc. v. Pussycat Cinema, Ltd., 467 F. Supp. 366, 376 (S.D.N.Y. 1979).
 See Smith v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 537 F. Supp. 2d 1302, 1339-40 (N.D. Ga. 2008) (Use of the terms WAL★OCAUST and WAL-QAEDA in referencing Wal-Mart’s trademarks in tee-shirts was held to be protected parodic noncommercial speech).

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