Brand Protection Updates & Summit Announcement

Over the holidays, the brand protection community saw a lot of positive movement in the fight against counterfeiting online and making shopping safe online.

The Integrity, Notification, and Fairness in Online Retail Marketplaces for Consumers (INFORM Consumers) Act?was officially passed by Congress and signed into law by President Biden on December 29, 2022, as part of the?2023 omnibus appropriations bill. This law?requires e-commerce platforms to take proactive measures to screen sellers including the requirement that?online marketplaces verify high-volume third-party sellers by authenticating the seller’s government ID, tax ID, bank account information, and contact information (vendors who have made 200 or more discrete sales in a 12-month period amounting to $5,000 or more). ?This is in addition to the reactive measures that they have been required to do for years. A-CAPP researchers wrote about the importance of this law and testified to the need for it in 2020 and 2021.

Additionally, the European Court of Justice in the Christian Louboutin v. Amazon case said e-commerce platforms may be liable for the sale of counterfeits by third parties if they give the impression that they are responsible for the advertisements of counterfeit goods. In 2019, two cases in?Belgium and Luxembourg and Belgium asked the EU Court of Justice to determine whether an online marketplace can be liable under Article 9(2) of the EU Trade Mark Regulation 2017/1001 for the display of advertisements of infringing goods. The Decision dated December 22 notes this and then returns the cases back to the Luxembourg and Belgium courts to interpret the CJEU's ruling.

On March 21-23, we will be hosting our 6th Annual Brand Protection Strategy Summit where we'll discuss these changes in combatting online sales of counterfeit goods.

We anticipate more changes to follow and look forward to seeing how INFORM Consumers gets practically implemented.

Happy 2023- keep up the good fight!