The Fight Against the Pretense- Brands and Fakes

Living in an era where the fakes are as many as originals is not a child’s chore and protecting your brand against despicable forged items is another task.  Counterfeit is the biggest rogue that a brand can or has to deal with as it comes along with unimaginable complications and stress.

Many a time’s brands are unaware of the amount of fake copies of their products available in the market. This does not only mean loss of sale but also leads to loss of goodwill due to the contemptible worth of the fakes. Copies and fakes do not only restrict themselves to products but also to designs, logos, packaging, infect, all intellectual property.

Brands and Fakes as a global platform has taken the onus to assist in the fight against the counterfeit. We are an online podium in India offering, fake complaints protection services we also make available information on fake products, distinguish between fake and genuine products. It is a podium where brand owners and consumers are offered to raise their voice against second copy products, fake complaints, trademark fraud investigation, and other IPR compliance services hence acting as a dais that assists brands and fights for their cause. We can help take action against duplicates by help you recognise and act in opposition to the forged products existing in the market.

Brands and Fakes helps you get all Information on Fake Products required for taking action against them.  Our team of experts includes the leading professionals of the industry coming from assorted spheres of brand protection services, IT, content writers, branding, marketing, finance and legal to aid you with the best in class intellectual property right solutions for IPR compliances.

We need to realize that fake or more so inferior goods do not only hamper the brand image but also affect the economy on the whole.  The goal of Brands and Fakes is not restricted to a particular class; we cater to the society on whole by dealing with IPR issues from scratch. Our services include everything right from the information on fake to taking or assisting in taking action against them.  We will cater to your needs if you are a brand that has needs to discover counterfeit of its product available in the market or the consumer who has been cheated with a bogus product.  Let’s be aware and alert to fight this battle against forgery.

Intellectual Property Right Solutions- Ambiguous in our minds not under law

Every single day makes us realize that there are so many duplicates and copies existing in this world. Be it a copy of the DVD of our favorite movie or a name of an eating joint, sometimes nattily and sometimes disorderly designed to match the name and pattern of our favourite restaurant. What do we generally do in such scenarios? Ignore it? Or probably walk away laughing at the situation. But we must understand that there is much more to such copies or fakes than a hearty laughter.

A design, logo, trademark or such work is referred to as intellectual property. These intellectual properties are governed by IP Laws and matters related to them fall under IPR issues. IPR plays an extremely important role in almost every quarter while talking about any kind of intellectual property related to businesses and work of art. These also include investment and new venture decisions. Anyone who thinks about, analyses and produces any form of product, needs to have some kind of access to IPR related laws and rules to avoid conflict of interest with some other variety, not just at that point in time but also for future reference.

There are full-fledged businesses these days working towards the protection of brands and providing exhaustive services in cases of IPR infringement. Brands and Fakes is one such platform providing best in class brand protection services in India.  Brands and fakes essentially brings brand owners, consumers, IPR professionals and industry thought leaders together to fight forgery and all other violations related to IPR. It also provides entrée to consumers, volunteers and IPR professionals for capturing, validating and managing information on fake products & other IPR infringements. At Brands and Fakes, we use the power of internet, mobile and social media to manage information on violations related to IPR and instigate a course of action against fake products & violators. In addition to this, Brands and Fakes also provides you with all Patent related Services, trade mark related Services, Registration of designs and copyrights, Patent/ Trademark and copyrights related Agreements, Corporate Agreements etc.

For a layman or an ordinary consumer, differentiating between products from copies is an uncertain situation. There are instances wherein distinguish between fake and genuine products is not very difficult, which is in the cases of apparent disparity. But some brands have noteworthy similarity and it becomes very difficult to spot the difference in one go. Though, whatever the case maybe, copying another brand in terms of anything, be it design, logo, name etc amounts to IPR infringement. And it is the work of specialized agencies to investigate and collect data on IPR violations in India. Working towards achieving this goal are lawyers, investigative agents, agencies and a plethora of other people. At Brands and Fakes, we provide you all these specialisations under one roof.

Being an extremely competitive global economy, IPR issues in India are rising at an alarming rate. Copying or imitating a brand, piece of art, discovery etc without the consent of the owner is a crime under the IPR guidelines set out by our law. IPR in itself is a full-bodied subject. A license under IPR such as Trademark Registration, Copyright protection etc provides you with legitimate ownership of that product. On having the registration a brand manages to save itself from not just crucial and never ending court proceedings but also manages to create an image of a trustworthy brand. Moreover, it also provides monetary compensation and claim of damages.

As a brand owner, it is one’s duty and right to follow the guidelines of IPR and seek restoration of rights under the same in case of violation.

Where to Find Data on IPR Violations for Brand Protection in India

Upon becoming aware that your brand is being infringed by another person/entity using an identical or a deceptively similar name/word, the first action – after recovering from your first reaction of shock – is to find out information on fake products and brand. There are many ways to collect such information and different places from where such information can be gathered. The present article gives a brief insight about the two most important methods and/or places from where such data can be gathered.

The first resource, in this digital era, is the internet. There is, practically, no information which cannot be got from the internet – that is if you know how to phrase search strings and if you know in which websites you should look into. The internet, in relation to material about infringing products, has a plethora of websites which lets you gather valuable information and if not, which provides you with leads. Starting from the infringer’s own website, if any, there are other directory websites which provide a listing of products, manufacturers, distributors, types of products, pictures of products, addresses and places where such products are sold. Many a times, the manufacturers themselves approach these websites to enlist their entity and product in order to advertise their products. These websites may be found by a single click on ‘Google’ when you type the infringing product’s name, to begin with.

Going further, in the event the infringing entity is registered as a limited company, the website of the Registrar of Companies provides a detailed set of information about the type of Company, its financial magnitude, information on its directors, year of registration, etc. all of which is very valuable information in the event your action to protect your brand(s) leads you to a legal proceeding.

Aside from the internet, is the good old way and probably, the most effective one still, is the physical investigation which is carried out by employing an experienced investigator who visits the place of the infringer – manufacturing facility, office premises, distribution office, warehouse, etc. – and collects as much information as possible including pictures, receipts and samples of infringing products.

While, a brand owner might not be able to directly do all this research and investigation, it is possible, and in fact better, for them to approach entities which provide brand protection services in India. These entities are well experienced with the places from where data can be gathered and also in the process of investigation, which provides brand owners with a great amount of information about the infringing product(s), thereby, allowing them to prepare and proceed with their actions against such products.

Brands and Fakes Web Based Platform: Avoiding Copyright Infringement

Have you ever uploaded an image or a video to a website, only for it to be deleted because of copyright issues? While some areas of copyright law can be complicated enough to cause copyright lawyers sleepless nights, the basics are very simple. Armed with some simple principles, you can save yourself from running afoul of copyright law.

Understand the scope of copyright law. 

It does protect literary works, paintings, photographs, drawings, films, music (and its lyrics), choreography, sculptures and many other things. It generally doesn't protect the underlying ideas, and it does not protect facts. For example, copyright doesn't prevent you from expressing in your own words ideas and facts found in a book or journal you read (but you should always give appropriate credit to the sources in which you found them; it is common courtesy to do so, and not doing so could constitute a violation of the Copyright Act as what you have created may constitute a derivative work pursuant to the Copyright Act, unless you have obtained license or permission from the copyright holder to create the same). It may also constitute plagiarism under state common law.

Don't take anything from the Internet, or anywhere else, because it is almost always copyrighted, by default. 

"I found it on the Internet" is not a defense against copyright infringement; works on the Internet are as copyrightable as any other kind of work. Nor is "it didn't say it was copyrighted." In nearly all jurisdictions and all other Berne Convention signatories, it is not necessary for a work to have an explicit copyright notice for it to be copyrighted. It is also not necessary for copyright in a work to be registered; this simply makes it easier to be compensated in court. Without an explicit dedication to the public domain, assume that it is still under copyright.

Don't confuse copyrights, trademarks, and other forms of "intellectual property."

The term "intellectual property rights" itself, and the kind of thinking it encourages, has led to these very different things being confused with each other. Trademarks, for example, forbid using certain words, marks, symbols, and so on within certain contexts, to protect consumers from misrepresentation. Copyright would not prevent you from, for example, writing some new text editor software and calling it "Microsoft Text Editor", but trademark law would.

Be creative.

If ever you wonder whether a certain action would infringe on the copyright of someone else, the question to ask is: is this a creative work on my count, or am I simply drawing from the creativity of someone else? Lunches, as any economist would tell you, are not free. Some examples:

·         Scanning something yourself does not, by itself, give you a new copyright over anything. You cannot scan a photograph from, say, a magazine and then put it on the Internet; the copyright would still reside with the author of the work. The flip-side of this is that scanning a work which is in the public domain would not, in many jurisdictions, give you the copyright over the resulting scan.

·         Taking a screenshot of a video or a computer program does not generate a new copyright. The copyright in the resulting screenshot would still be held by the copyright holder of the original video or computer program.

·         Some non-creative things are not copyrightable, for example, a plain text logo in a generic font. Neither are simple geometric shapes. But don't rely on this unless you are certain.

Learn about the public domain laws for your jurisdiction. 

"Public domain" is short-hand for "uncopyrighted", not "publicly distributed". A work can be out of copyright due to age, by the nature of authorship, or other reasons.

Don't rely on "fair use" called "fair dealing" in many jurisdictions, fair use is simply a guarantee that copyright laws do not infringe freedom of speech and make critical commentary impossible.

Some uses of text under "fair use" are teaching, critiques, comments, reporting, and research. It permits, for example, limited quoting of copyrighted material. In some jurisdictions, it would allow creating a copy for personal use (such as a backup)^[4]. It is not a blank cheque granting you a right to do anything at all and call it "fair use". Fair use is an extremely complex body of case law; it is often very difficult for non-lawyers to tell in advance whether or not a certain use will be considered fair use in court. If in doubt, seek permission first.

Be wary about writing fiction based on other works. 

It was said above that "ideas cannot be copyrighted". However, fictional characters, story-lines, and settings can be copyrighted (insofar as they are original). This means that fan-fiction, drawings of characters from copyrighted works, and so on are all technically copyright infringements. Sometimes copyright holders turn a blind eye to this sort of thing, but unless it has been explicitly authorised, don't count on this being the case.

WHY TO SPEND ON YOUR BRANDS?

Billions of dollars are spent in building up a Company, marketing its services and advertising its products. However, during a God forbidden lean period, the first question which arises is whether a budget needs to be allocated to the protection of the Company’s own brand. The Brand – a Company’s best and ever non-failing asset; and a brand is well mixed with Intellectual Property Right Solutions emanating from it.

Whether or not a lean period, the aspect of protecting one’s own brand has, in recent times, become a more than top priority. While a few wise companies and business owners spend a fortune on protecting their brand, most others do not realize and spend too little or none in this regard.

Why protect or spend money in safeguarding your brand? The answer is quite simple. Allow your brand to be used by infringers or watch it getting diluted without even raising a finger and you end up loosing your company’s best asset. The one asset which gave you exclusivity in the minds of consumers. Loose your asset and you loose your business. Simple!

The commonly used phrase, ‘IPR compliance’ would necessarily mean procuring, defending and safeguarding a brand owner’s intellectual property rights in its brand. So, how and who does this work?

Brand protection services in India is an emerging and potential market and involves IPR protection and compliance. While a few brand owners and companies have their own in-house team engaged in safeguarding their brand, most other companies and brand owners have chosen to engage specialists who provide brand protection services in India. These specialists have their own team of experts who provide comprehensive solutions to your IPR Compliance needs and ensure that your brand is protected for all times to come.

India being a developing market, it is good trend to note that everyday new business owners emerge with their brands and existing companies and brand owners expand their business. But, truth being said, for that same reason, the number of infringers has also been on a steady rise; and along with that number, the various and ever-increasing unique types of infringements in the different fields of businesses and enterprises.

Needless to say, unless you are a billion dollar enterprise which can afford to have its own in-house team, the best way to proceed would be to hire these market specialists to safeguard your brand and the intellectual property rights associated with them. Money spent on this, I would say, is the only money well spent.