In recent years, china has been increasing its protection of intellectual property rights, but cases of intellectual property abuse, such as piracy and counterfeiting, continue to occur. The reasons behind the frequency of the cases, apart from the fact that the products of piracy, forgery and abuse are cheaper than the products of abuse, and thus have a great incentive for ordinary consumers, are not aware that the far-reaching effects of piracy, forgery, abuse of products on our national economy and the direct harm to consumer realities are another major cause. In view of this, the analysis of the direct harm to consumer realities of ipr abuse, the active resistance of a wide range of consumers to piracy, counterfeiting and abuse of products, and the creation of an overall awareness that the protection of iprs is the protection of consumer rights, should be another important step in strengthening intellectual property protection beyond legislation, justice and enforcement。
Intellectual property rights mainly include patents, trademarks, copyrights (including ordinary copyrights such as books, copyrights for computer software, etc.) and commercial secrets. The infringement of intellectual property rights has a negative impact on consumer rights, mainly in the following areas:
Impact of patent infringement and commercial secrecy on consumer interests
Technology development and innovation are important guarantees of product quality, performance and consumer experience. Consumers' pursuit of cutting-edge, advanced products will never be sustainable unless enterprises phase out old products and develop new ones. The key to product innovation is in technology innovation and access to and application of cutting-edge, advanced technology information。
In today's social competition, technology research and development, innovation and innovation require greater financial investment and cyclicality, and enterprises need to take greater technological and market risks. In my country, technological innovation in enterprises is largely protected through patent systems and commercial secrecy. The easy mobile communication we currently enjoy, the sound of the video, the vr system and the high-speed data transmission are closely protected through numerous patents, while the delicious coca-cola we enjoy is strictly protected by commercial secrets. The patent system and the business secrecy protection system not only protect differential competition, but also provide high profit feedback and returns to patent holders and business secret rights holders who pay research and development costs, not only giving them the incentive to sustain research and development innovation, but also the support of real profit money。
The vast majority of consumers enjoy advanced communication, high-speed access to the internet, intelligent transport and teaching, audio-visual feasts with great sense of satisfaction, and so forth, as a result of the results of high-tech research and development in enterprises. While consumers may receive low-price benefits in the short term, illegal manufacturers, through infringement of patents and technological secrets, will in the long run deny the original firm an effective return on its inputs, thus seriously undermining the original firm's confidence in r & d and discouraging its incentives. Without r & d and innovation, consumers will not continue to enjoy better creative, better quality and safer products。
Impact of trademark infringement on consumer rights
Trademarks are important markers for consumers to distinguish between different products and services, as well as important grounds for selection of products and services by a wide range of consumers, who usually use trademarks to distinguish between goods or services and make purchase decisions. Article 1 of china's trademarks law stipulates that, in order to “pull producers and operators to guarantee the quality of goods and services and to safeguard the credibility of trademarks in order to safeguard the interests of consumers and producers and operators”, and article 7 stipulates that “the users of trademarks shall be responsible for the quality of goods they use the trademarks”。
It follows that trademarks have basic quality assurance functions for products and services. Trademarks represent consistent and stable quality standards and quality assurance for trademark users. High-quality and well-recognised goods and services will increase the visibility, influence of their trademarks, and high-profile, well-recognised and credible trademarks will increase the market competitiveness of the goods and services. Thus, for trademark users, especially the producers and service providers of the respective goods, it is necessary to continuously improve and improve the quality of their products and the quality of their services in order to preserve the credibility of their trademarks and to attract consumers to purchase their own goods and services。
Article 8 of china's consumer rights and protection act provides that “consumers have the right to know the truth about the goods they purchase, use or services they receive” and article 9 provides that “consumers have the right to choose goods or services of their own accord. Consumers have the right to choose the operator who provides the goods or services, to choose the variety of the goods or the mode of service, to purchase or not to purchase any of them, to accept or not accept any of them. Consumers have the right to compare, identify and select when choosing goods or services on their own.” trademarks, on the other hand, are attached to specific goods and services, and the goodwill they carry is both a declaration and a guarantee of product, quality of service and an important reference for consumers in selecting goods and services。
Trademark infringement not only infringes the legitimate rights and interests of trademark rights holders, but also makes the goods purchased by consumers unsymmetrical, and thus infringes the consumer's right to know and to choose freely. Strictly combating trademark abuse and guaranteeing consumers access to genuine branded goods and the enjoyment of the same quality of service as the immediate needs of the operator and the inherent needs of the wider consumer。
Impact of copyright violations on consumer rights
As the demand for reading quality increases, not only the rationality of the content of knowledge, but also the paper quality, will be taken into account in publishing. However, many pirated books are made of hard paper, and the printing of ink can be confusing. Furthermore, it is known that incompetent paper, ink and glue may contain toxic heavy metal elements in many colourful pirated drawings. Moreover, there is a high incidence of text errors in pirated books that affect consumer knowledge absorption. Thus, piracy of books affects the physical and mental health of consumers, and its specific effects on consumer rights are mainly in two ways:
1. The pirated software leaves behind a broken back door, is easily implanted in advertising or exposed to hacking, resulting in slow running, unknown aircraft, etc. The lack of maintenance and subsequent updating of pirated software has resulted in unstable performance and incomplete functionality, leading to the collapse of computers, websites and the loss of data, resulting in immeasurable direct economic losses。
2. Since 2001, the country has been increasing its protection of software copyrights and has vigorously combated all kinds of violations of software intellectual property rights. In addition to potentially facing claims from software copyright holders, the piracy abuses are contrary to our broader agenda of promoting the construction and formalization of software by intellectual property powers, and infringers may be subject to administrative sanctions by copyright authorities, which may lead to criminal prosecution, thereby posing unnecessary compliance risks。
In conclusion, the protection of intellectual property rights is essentially to protect the legitimate interests of consumers. In addition to using legal coercive measures to severely combat abuse, forgery and piracy, the state should create a favourable climate in society as a whole for respect for intellectual property rights and the purchase of authentic products. It leads consumers to become ashamed of buying pirated copies and proud of buying them. While providing high-quality products and services to consumers, firms should focus more on adapting business models, reducing operating costs and providing a wide range of consumers with the assurance and benefits of buying good goods。
Author: sun dae yong, a partner in the office of dae-jin law firm (shenzhen), who specializes in dealing with difficult and complex and highly divisive cases, has on several occasions successfully represented the judicial decisions of law enforcement agencies that have withdrawn, modified patent law enforcement agencies, grass-roots people's courts, intermediate people's courts and even provincial high people's courts. Counsel has provided professional legal services to well-known domestic and foreign clients, such as siemens, fuscon, nakang, haile, kimmen goghul and daiji innovation。
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