Earlier this month in Lifestyle Equities CV and another v Ahmed and another the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom held that the company directors of Hornby Street Limited, siblings Kashif and Bushra Ahmed, were not jointly liable with their company for trade mark infringement.
Read MoreOn 21 May 2024, the Federal Circuit overturned the Rosen-Durling test used to assess non-obviousness of design patents. In LKQ Corporation v. GM Global Technology Operations LLC, the Court en banc ruled the same conditions for patentability that apply to utility patents apply to design patents, specifically holding the obviousness rationale articulated in KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007), will now apply to design patents. LKQ Corp. v. GM Glob. Tech. Operations LLC, No. 2021-2348, 2024 WL 2280728, at 1 (Fed. Cir. May 21, 2024) (en banc).
Read MoreThe UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has released an update this month in relation to the issue of trade mark applicants and owners providing a valid address for service. Particularly following Brexit there has been concerns about would-be trade mark owners filing applications with false or ineffective addresses for service and as a result the UKIPO is now taking a more proactive approach using their powers under Rule 11 of the Trade Mark Rules 2008.
Read MoreImagine receiving a call from a friend asking about a new money-making opportunity you just posted on your social media account. Only, you did not post it. This is a story that many social media users face as the number of hacked social media accounts continues to rise. In a letter dated March 5 2024, 41 state Attorney Generals wrote Meta Platforms Inc. highlighting a significant rise in the number of hacked accounts being reported to their offices, (noting increases from 2022 to 2023: 730% increase in Vermont; 330% increase in North Carolina; 256% increase in Illinois; and 270% increase in Pennsylvania), and urging Meta to take immediate action. In a world where social media is engrained as a daily part of our lives, losing control of your social media identity can cause stress and have an impact on your professional and personal brand. Here are some suggested steps you can take to prevent having your account taken over and address it should hacking occur.
Read MoreThe metaverse and related technologies like virtual goods, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and blockchain, represent a fundamental shift in how we interact with the internet, as the distinction between our activity online and in real life begins to blur. These emerging technologies present enormous opportunities for businesses, but bring with them a number of difficult legal challenges.
Read MoreIn a recent decision, the High Court of England and Wales has found that Tesco’s use of the yellow and blue Tesco Clubcard logos (reproduced below) infringed Lidl’s trade marks (see the relevant Lidl marks below) and also gave rise to copyright infringement and passing off.
Read MoreEuropean Patent Office: Enlarged Board of Appeal decision G2/21
The Enlarged Board of Appeal EBoA is the highest judicial authority under the European Patent Convention. It handles patent examination for about 37 member states including the EU. The EBoA has recently published its decision G2/21 dealing with the principle of free evaluation of evidence in the context of inventive step. This decision is relevant for patents in the pharma, biotech and life science field.
Read MoreSome of the largest false advertising jury verdicts were recorded in 2022. This, coupled with increased inflationary pressures will likely lead to an uptick in false advertising suits given that such pressures will impact consumer spending habits, leading to increased scrutiny of competitor advertising practices—particularly in the social media space.
Read MoreThe Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit recently held that merely removing copyright management information (CMI), without showing that that defendant knew or would have reason to know that its actions would induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal a copyright infringement is insufficient to meet the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s (DMCA) requirements for liability for wrongful removal of CMI.1
CMI typically consists of items such as title and authorship. In the digital world, CMI frequently is provided in metadata, essentially background technical data about a digital work. Metadata is a set of data that describes and provides information about other data. CMI typically is included in the metadata embedded in photographs, videos, documents, and other digital media. When distributing a digital work, the metadata, including CMI, may be altered in the course of reformatting the work, typically to reduce the size of the work.
Read MoreJuventus FC (affectionately nicknamed the “Old Lady”) has won a noteworthy ruling in its case of trade mark infringement brought against the non-fungible token (“NFT“) producer Blockeras s.r.l (“Blockeras”). The Rome Court of First Instance, on 20 July 2022, ruled that the unauthorised minting, advertising and sale of NFTs1 can infringe the trade mark rights of the relevant owner.
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