Trademark Protection and E-Commerce

This research paper analyzes the impact of e-commerce on trademark protection in China and the USA. It discusses the international treaties signed by both countries and the challenges faced in protecting intellectual property rights in the online sphere. The paper also examines how e-commerce has increased the utility of trademarks as a means of brand protection.

Running head: TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Trademark Protection and E-Commerce
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Introduction
Intellectual property (IP) is a statutory term that refers to the industrial property rights. It
deals with the protection of trademark, copyrights, designs and patents rights. Despite being
intangible, it holds significant value similar to the tangible or physical property. The value of the
IP rights have enhanced owing to its relevance in advanced technology of the contemporary era.
IP includes original expressions, new ideas, distinctive appearance and names that make a
product valuable and unique. IP is closely related to e-commerce as more than any other business
systems, e-commerce includes selling of services and products that mostly related to IP and its
licensing. For instance, music, software, photos, designs, etc are all traded through e-commerce
and IP being the main component of such services and products it holds great importance1. The
research paper aims at analyzing two jurisdictions in the context of International treaties, impact
of the online commerce in the enhanced utility of Trademark as a means of a brand protection. It
shall also discuss how online commerce affects some aspects of rights enforcement by
stakeholders. The two different jurisdictions include China and USA and this paper shall
determine the interdependence of the e-commerce and intellectual property at the international
level. The rationale for selecting the two jurisdictions is that USA is one of the economic
superpower of the world and China is considered as the upcoming economic superpower and
protection of IP rights, in particular, trademark law is a fundamental element of a successful
economy. The two nations are globally recognized for their excellent centers for trade and
commerce.
China and Trademark protection
China first enacted legislation on trademark of the country in 1950 and 1963. The
trademark legislation in 1963 became effective in 1980 when the country became a state party to
the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The domestic statutes that govern the
trademarks laws in the country include the Trademark Law 2013 and the Implementing
Regulation of the Trademark Law 20142. While the enactment of the Trademark law, there was
no specific definition of what constituted a trademark and did not include any precise definition
1 Liu, Yongpei. "E-Commerce intellectual property rights protection in China." Intellectual Property & Technology
Law Journal 28.8 (2016): 14.
2 Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China 2013

2TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
of the terms ‘collective marks, or service marks3’. At the time of enactment of the trademark
legislation in the country, majority of the Chinese companies were owned by the state due to
which the competition and infringement of services and products were very less.
The emergence of a market economy in China and the gradual rise in the competition
between the services and goods led several companies to imitate the reputable service marks of
other companies. Consequently, this led to unfair confusion and competition, which eventually
affected the reputation of the original owners of such marks. This is one significant reason why
the country enacted legislations to safeguard the trademark rights. The Trademark Law
describes a ‘registered trademark’ as one that has been registered and approved. Subsequent to
the registration of the trademark, the registrant becomes entitled to the legal protection of the
trademark exclusively. Although the law does not prevent the use of a trademark that is not
registered, only that such trademark is excluded from the legal protection that is otherwise
accorded to a registered trademark.
Since the trademark law of the country, do not provide any precise definition of the term
‘trademark’, it provides that designs, words or combination of the two may be used as
trademarks which should be distinctive to be distinguishable from other words, designs or
combination of both4. Therefore, in general, any mark that is used as a trademark refers to a mark
that is distinct and different from other forms of marks. Registered trademark is denoted with an
encircled letter “R” and the validity of registered trademark lasts until 10 years subsequent to its
approval.
The first amendment of the 1993 Trademark law extended protection to include service
marks and making all the legal provisions applicable to trademarks to be equally applicable to
service marks. However, despite such extension, neither the statute nor the amendment defined
service marks or trademarks. This omission distinguishes the Trademark law from other regional
intellectual property laws and Chinese intellectual property laws.
China and International treaties
3 Implementing Regulation of the Trademark Law 2014
4 Friedmann, Danny. "Protection against Abuse of Trademark Law in Greater China: A Brief Analysis of the
People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan." Cal. W. Int'l LJ 47 (2016): 157.

3TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
China is a signatory to the following IP-related international treaties include the Madrid
Agreement, the Madrid Protocol, the Berne Convention, the Nice Agreement, the Agreement
on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and the Paris Convention5. In case of
any dispute, international treaties shall prevail over the national statutes6. The country agreed to
the international treaties to strengthen the trademark laws of the country especially the Madrid
Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks (Madrid Agreement) and the
International Convention for the Protection of Industrial property (Paris Convention) in
19897. However, Turban (2018) states that despite persisting broadcast by the country of his
intellectual property laws and assenting to international treaties, the trademark laws of the
country failed to provide sufficient protection to the trademark rights8. Further, there is sufficient
evidence to establish that China failed to provide maximum benefits to the foreigners from its
membership in those Foreign or International conventions9.
United States and International treaties on Trademark protection
While the agreement of the country with the Paris Convention obligated China to
safeguard service marks, there were no such methods implemented until the trademark laws was
amended in 1993. Giuffrida (2017) states that as per a US trade organization, the International
Intellectual Property Alliance estimated that the country has caused a loss of $415 million to the
US industries due to the failure of the county to safeguard US intellectual property adequately
which resulted in sale of printed goods in the year 1988. In 1991, the US government decided
that the country warranted a Special 301 investigation under Title III of the Trade Act of 1974
for its failure to implement intellectual property protections.
In order to prevent further loss in US businesses, United States and China signed a
Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in January 1992 whereby both countries agreed to
make the laws on infringement of intellectual property rights. Later, the United States agreed to
terminate the Special 301 investigations and removed China from its list of priority countries.
The Chinese legislators considered amendment of the trademark law to address issues pertaining
5 International Convention for the Protection of Industrial property (Paris Convention) 1989
6 Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks (Madrid Agreement).
7 The Protocol Relating to the Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks (Madrid
Protocol)
8 The Nice Agreement 1957.
9 Carpenter, Megan M. "Trademark Law Promotes Fair Competition, Not Morality." (2016).

4TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
to protection of service marks, registration of trademarks by deceptive means and the using
administrative regions as the name of trademark.
Trademarks owned by big US companies that spent large amounts of capital, resources
and labor to develop them can be stolen easily through internet or using other means10. The
Trademark Treaties and International Law (TTIL) Committee include treaties of the US and
other foreign countries as well as that of intergovernmental organizations, regulations, statutes or
rules that are related to copyright, trademark or patents, unfair competition which are likely to
affect the US companies11.
The US law applicable to trademarks includes the regulations of the US Trademark law,
Rule of Practice, Federal Statutes, 15 U.S.C and 35 U.S.C. 1. The secondary sources include
Trademark Manual of Examining Procedure 2009 as well as the Listing of Some US Code
Sections Protecting Specific Names, Marks and Terms 2009. In regards to the international
treaties to which the US is a signatory is the General Inter-American Convention for
Trademark and Commercial Protection [1931].
The Federal registration of the trademarks is not valid outside the country. Trademarks
rights are territorial and right pertaining to particular trademark exist only within the country that
has granted such rights. The US has not signed the Madrid Agreement unlike China, as the
international application depended upon the national registration. In other words, the US
trademark registration was much longer compared to other nations. The US has faced one
essential problem with the Protocol with respect to the description of goods. Where the domestic
trademark law of the US requires applicants to enumerate the goods and services associated with
the mark specifically, other countries permit for wider association of marks with the goods and
services. In fact, the International registration under the Madrid Protocol permits the scope of
the trademark protection to rely upon the basic registration. Therefore, US registrants are
restricted to the strict association of marks and goods required by US law.
In 2016, the Chinese Government published the draft of its first E-commerce law that
aimed at including all the major characteristics of e-commerce, which includes payment and
10 Trademark Treaties and International Law (TTIL) Committee.
11 Pras, Matthieu. "The use requirement for trademarks: a comparative study of the French, European Union
trademark and United States federal laws." (2016).

5TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
delivery methods as well. The law purports to fortify IP rights and to rebuke the retailers of the
fake products and the persons committing infringements. As per the statistical reports, China e-
commerce Research center exhibits that the trading volume of e-commerce market in China
reached 7.85 trillion RMB in 2012 and 10.5 trillion RMB in 2013. In 2017, the Standing
Committee of the National People’s Congress published the second draft of the e-commerce law
which aimed at regulating the rapidly growing e-commerce sector and thus, facilitate growth and
maintain ‘market order’ as well as to eliminate counterfeits and scams.
E-commerce law: China and USA
At present, the most active e-commerce websites concentrate on the industries like
apparel, horticulture, agriculture, textile, machinery and equipment, digital household appliances,
food and wine, hardware and tools, pharmaceuticals and healthcare12. In addition to this growing
online trend, the provisions pertaining to protection of intellectual property rights in the online
sphere is being subjected to variety of challenges. According to Cheung, Ming and Cheng-Fu
Yang (2016), the important aspects of e-commerce that distinguishes it from the conventional
economic model is a hub for “transaction” and “information”. In other words, it is the
“network” that is differentiates the modern e-commerce oriented economy from the traditional
economy of the country. Therefore, the complete transaction process including the payment,
information transfer and the delivery of physical commodities that usually occur and are
completed concurrently in the conventional form of transactions13. This entire process is
differentiated in e-commerce and is completed due to the participation of several service
providers.
Kotabe (2014) states that these differences result in two types trademark infringement
issues in e-commerce. Firstly, majority of the issues take place in the technological data sectors.
In regards to the traditional economic mode, transactions are often associated with physical
goods like circulation and display of such goods14. The definition of trademark law in the light of
traditional infringement is based on the characteristics that transactions are associated with
physical products directly. For instance, using of trademarks on goods, selling counterfeit goods,
12 12. Turban, Efraim, et al. "E-Commerce: Regulatory, Ethical, and Social Environments." Electronic Commerce
2018. Springer, Cham, 2018. 573-612.
13Baek, Young-Mi. "Current status of E-commerce market in China and implication." Journal of Digital
Convergence 13.1 (2015): 111-124.
14 Kotabe, Masaaki, and Kristiaan Helsen. Global marketing management. 2014.

6TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
etc. On the other hand, Turban (2018) asserts that the e-commerce mode provides information
online. Besides the availability of massive information online, identifying, selecting and
determining trading partners had become fundamental requisites for conducting a complete
transaction, which is equally important as the product itself. The issue that may arise is whether
the new form of using trademark that deals with transaction information shall amount to
infringement of trademark.
Secondly, the other significant issue that may arise is related to the joint infringement of
trademark that is, to determine the join liability in such trademark violations. This issue may
arise due to the inseparable support that third party service providers extend in every transactions
sector, making it one of the significant challenges in e-commerce infringement.
Due to global limitations of e-commerce and its rapid growth, the regulation of e-
commerce has become an intricate issue. The third party service providers in e-commerce
transactions had given rise to joint infringement issues15.
E-commerce commerce has increased the utility of Trade Marks as a means of brand
protection: China and USA
The term brand protection refers to online marketplace. It means preventing someone
from illegally selling or making a product using a brand name that is owned by another
company16. Branding is an important means for businesses all around the world that aims to
expand their market share in other countries. One of the effective ways to establish a strong
relationship between consumers and its brand is to use a unique as well as a simple name: its
trademark. While selecting a trademark, it is important to avert any sort of similarity and
confusion regarding the name that has been registered ready.
If identical trademarks are used in correlation with identical products, it is likely to give
rise o confusion. In the context of international law, TRIPS Agreement deals with this problem
under Article [16(1)], which states that the use of identical sign for identical services or goods
may give rise to confusion and there is no requirement to establish such confusion by providing
15Cheung, Ming, and Cheng-Fu Yang. "The e-commerce revolution: ensuring trust and consumer rights in China."
Applied System Innovation (ICASI), 2016 International Conference on. IEEE, 2016.
16 Heath, Davidson, and Chris Mace. "What's a Brand Worth? Trademark Protection, Profits, and Strategy." (2017).

7TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
evidence as it will entitle the owner of the original trademark to full protection17. The negative
impact of trademark infringement has led the governments undertake measures to reduce such
incidence of trademark violations. Liu (2016) states that if a reputed brand is affected by several
infringements such as counterfeiters place goods of inferior quality using the brand name of the
original otherwise reputed company, the consumers of the brand will lose their faith and
confidence in that brand, affecting both the financial as well as social reputation of the
company18.
There have been a rise in the online shopping compared to shopping from local stores and
malls in the past years. There are three types of e-commerce namely, business-to-business
(B2B), business-to-customer (B2C) and customer-to-customer (C2C). At present, there has
been an incline in the B2c and C2C e-commerce type prevalent in China and in the US as well
due to the availability of several websites and platforms, which makes such business transactions
easy and convenient. E-commerce makes cross-border commerce easy and convenient as well
which makes the seller and buyer gain profits19. However, Cheung (2018) states that with such
profits and convenience relevant issues and threats also accompany such profits. The
counterfeiters target certain brands more than the other brands, especially those having higher
value, luxury brands dealing with designer accessories attracts more counterfeiters.
Social media has become a common and easy means for the brands to enhance their
customers and sales. In the absence of any effective regulations, counterfeiter uses this medium
to promote their products in a zero-cost and efficiently by impersonating official brands through
their personal profiles. Additionally, the counterfeiters continue to sell their fake luxury items
using e-commerce websites, marketplace listings, etc. This implies that effective protection of IP
rights is of great significance especially for foreign companies that are less familiar with Chinese
market because Chinese e-commerce can be both intimidating and challenging at the same
time20.
17 Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights [TRIPS Agreement]
18 Cheung, Ming. "28. the e-commerce revolution: ensuring trust and consumer rights in China." Handbook of
Cultural and Creative Industries in China (2016): 412.
19 Giuffrida, Maria, et al. "Cross-border B2C e-commerce to Greater China and the role of logistics: a literature
review." International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management 47.9 (2017): 772-795.
20 Nemeth, Charles P. Private security and the law. CRC Press, 2017.

8TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
China presents certain specific challenges for the owners of trademarks because in order
to enter into a Chinese market, it is important that the owners adjust their brand protection
strategies for addressing the problems related to Chinese counterfeits so that they can adapt to
the special challenges presented by enforcement in China21.
Successful enforcement is based on the assessment of the scope of brand infringement,
which would be an efficient strategy for action and well-prepared documentation22. In order to
create an effective enforcement strategy, it is important to comprehend the market places that
allure most traffic and such market places should be subjected to constant monitoring to ensure
that the products sold are legitimate.
China initiated efforts to improve the protection of the IP rights and adapt to international
standards when China ratified the bilateral Agreement on Trade Relations between the United
States of America and People’s Republic of China and became a signatory to the WIPO.
Subsequent to the economic development, Chinese Government has been attempting to
undertake effective measures to avert violation of IP rights like the recent Draft of E-Commerce
law, Amendment in the Trademark Law in 2014, development of new policies against
trademark infringement and an Action Plan for implementing national IP strategy23. The
amendments in the Trademark law ensures a stronger and stringent protection system for
trademarks owners as it has made proof of infringement easier and has empowered the courts to
obtain accounting books of the infringer to calculate the damages. Statutory damages have been
enhanced from RMB 500,000 to RMB 3,000,000.
The USA pressurized China to improve its IPR protection system and some other
essential International Conventions like the Paris Conventions and the Madrid agreement.
However, Luo (2016) states that despite such efforts to improve the IPRs protection system and
compliance with the provisions of the TRIPS agreement and WTO obligation, China failed to
fulfill certain obligations to implementing effective ad stringent IP rights rules. Nica (2015)
argues that the US Trade Representative (USTR) used twenty federal agencies to evaluate the
21 Luo, Kevin. "E-Commerce laws and practices in China." Ariz. J. Int'l & Comp. L. 33 (2016): 219.
22 Liu, Yongpei. "E-Commerce intellectual property rights protection in China." Intellectual Property & Technology
Law Journal 28.8 (2016): 14.
23Nica, Elvira. "Positive drivers of consumer trust in e-commerce." Journal of Self-Governance and Management
Economics 3.1 (2015): 60-65.

9TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
activities of China. It was found that China had limited market access to foreign enterprises and
goods and lacked transparency, which signified weak enforcement of IPRs.
The US Chamber of Commerce and International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA)
stated that China failed to reduce counterfeiting since its accession to WTO and there was lack of
transparency with respect to IPR infringement data rule making and enforcement procedures.
Through the mandatory WTO dispute settlement process, the US filed formal complaints against
China in 2007 alleging that China’s criminal prosecution for trademark infringement was
declared void.
In 2009, China notified WTO Dispute Settlement Body and US that it would require a
reasonable period of time that is one year. Within 2010, China affirmed that it has satisfied the
requirements that have made amendments in the trademarks regulations.
E-commerce has undermined some aspects of rights enforcement by stakeholders
China
Due to the rapid growth in online commerce, the right owners often face with respect to
trademark enforcement is sale of parallel imported goods in the sphere of e-commerce24. The
goods include those that are though genuine, but they are sold in other countries25. Even majority
of enforcement authorities or court put such issues to one side. In other words, the courts or the
enforcement authorities are careful while determining whether such conduct amounts to violation
of infringement. This attitude of courts is evident from the landmark case Victoria’s Secret v
Shanghai Jin Tian26 that was held for trial in the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s
Court.
However, in certain cases the courts may consider more factors such as Michelin v Tan
Guoqiang27 etc. In this case, the Changsha Intermediate People’s Court stated that considering
the security of transactions through e-commerce, the tire quality is directly associated with the
24 Turban, Efraim, et al. "Business-to-Business E-Commerce." Electronic Commerce 2018. Springer, Cham, 2018.
123-166.
25 Li, Seth Siyuan, and Elena Karahanna. "Online recommendation systems in a B2C E-commerce context: a review
and future directions." Journal of the Association for Information Systems 16.2 (2015): 72.
26 Victoria’s Secret v Shanghai Jin Tian [2013] E.I.P.R. 610
27 Michelin v Tan Guoqiang [2009]. Case No.0073

10TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
property and personal safety of the passengers and the drivers28. Therefore, the tire manufacturers
will usually produce as well as sell the tire that satisfies various geographic, climate and
complete standard requirements in countries of sale. Similarly, there may be safety concerns but
it still violates the legal provisions of China, hence, should be forbidden by law. Hence, Nemeth
(2017) states that this case aimed at stating the principle that unauthorized sale may affect the
interests of the trademark owner irrespective of the fact who manufactured the products.
Chinese consumers are very conscious and perceive trademark as emblems of reputation
of a firm and ensured management standard. Trademark recognition often encourages consumers
to purchase a product. Therefore, trademark of products highly affects the consumers in China.
Alternatively, Friedmann (2016) asserts that deceptive and manipulative use of trademarks are
often used to pass fake goods as genuine good, which ultimately will have an adverse impact on
the trademark holders. Hence, Chinese officials are justified in considering the trademark laws of
the country to be playing a significant role in promoting the commodity economy of the country
to ensure product quality and safeguarding consumer interests.
The acts amounting to infringement include selling of products on e-commerce platforms,
which can only be sold directly as per agreement. It includes selling of products online, which is
otherwise required to be sold certain regional territory as per its agreements. Further, there are
instances where luxury products with luxury brand name are sold on e-commerce whereas the
selling of such goods is restricted to specific circumstances that are subjected to restrictions of
the trademark owners29.
Pras (2016) criticizes the lacunae in the trademark status of the country which fails to
stipulates whether such statutes are legitimate or not. In the absence of any legal provision that
renders such acts or conducts or omission as violation of the trademark law, the trademark
owners face challenge with respect to their trademark protection on the internet. Further, in
Nippon Company case, brought in Shanghai and Jiangsu province, the courts in both the
regions stated that the defendants did not commit infringements on the ground that acts
28 Fang, Lily H., Josh Lerner, and Chaopeng Wu. "Intellectual property rights protection, ownership, and innovation:
Evidence from China." The Review of Financial Studies 30.7 (2017): 2446-2477.
29 Mu, Xiao. The Evolution of Well-Known Trademark Protection in China. Diss. The University of Manchester,
2016.

11TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
amounted to the fair use of Nippon trademarks30. Generally, most of the cases that are brought
before the courts require determination of whether the using of other’s trademarks in the
decoration of online amounts to trademark infringement. While determining such cases, the
courts usually consider whether such use was proper and fair or whether it would confuse the
public or whether such use will cause damages to the trademark owners.
USA
In the US, the sudden increase of user-generated content on the Internet, the competition
among the advertisers and the propagation of domain name registration in order to draw attention
of visitors to their respective websites, has pressurized the trademark owners to police their
online use of e trademarks by third party31. Competitors, consumers and others are posting
advertisements, posts, content on internet in which they are freely using the trademarks for their
personal purposes that are originally owned by some other parties.
According to Pras (2016), anyone who uses a trademark without the permission of the
owner should be aware of its liability for infringing the trademark rights. Nemeth (2017)
disagrees that any person who uses the unauthorized trademark of another person, such user does
not become liable for infringement of trademark. The trademark owners must be able to
diligently monitor the use of their trademark online and identify the difference between uses that
amounts to infringement and uses that requires further monitoring and harmless uses, which
should be ignored, but they do not amount to infringement.
In order to safeguard trademarks from being used by others under circumstances where
the use of the trademark leads to confusion, the Federal Trademark statute, the Lanham Act has
been enacted. This statute created a cause of action of cyber piracy which is also known as cyber
squatting that takes place when a person uses a domain name that is confusingly similar or
identical to the trademark owned by the original owner. Therefore, using trademark of another
party misleadingly or deliberately to deceive the consumers shall hold the person committing
such infringement liable irrespective of the fact whether the trademark infringed gives rise to
traditional infringement claim or it enjoys a federal trademark registration.
30 Burmann, Christoph, et al. "Identity-Based Trademark Protection." Identity-Based Brand Management. Springer
Gabler, Wiesbaden, 2017. 281-289.
31 Mitnick, David, Howard Greenstein, and Peter Kaminski. "System and method for onlne brand protection and
registry." U.S. Patent Application No. 14/692,180.

12TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be inferred that China has not only made amendments
to the trademark law, China has improved regulation of its e-commerce market by issuing a
specific E-commerce law. The e-commerce platforms shall have particular duties and obligations
among which they shall guarantee products quality, use service agreements, consumer’s
protection, and trade policies, which regulate their relationship with customers and operators. In
the context of trademark law, China and USA aims at maintaining transparency in the e-
commerce platforms. Contracts shall be clearly displayed and made available on the platform
website that would be filed with authorities. In the event of any modifications, any stakeholder
shall be able to comment and any such operator shall have the opportunity to disagree with the
modifications or leave the platform32.
Trademark infringement and counterfeiting has always remain a significant concern for
foreign brands that are willing to expand their business in China owing to rapidly growing
Chinese e-commerce market. Given that IP rights are subjected to violation over the internet, in
particular, provisions must be included in the e-commerce law that addresses issues pertaining to
brand protection and unfair competition33. This will set out the unauthorized acts or omissions
that amount to unfair competition, thus, fortifying the protection of the intellectual property
rights. Since 2012, Chinese Government has been trying to enhance IPR protection in the
country for which the country has established IP courts along with other relevant improvements.
The other advancement in order to safeguard IPR protection includes enhanced supervisions and
support by administrative authorities, growing importance of civil litigation and criminal
enforcement of trademark infringements.
32 Wilson, Jeremy M. "The future of brand protection: responding to the global risk." Journal of Brand Management
24.3 (2017): 271-283.
33 Wilson, Jeremy M., Clifford Grammich, and Fiona Chan. "Organizing for brand protection and responding to
product counterfeit risk: An analysis of global firms." Journal of Brand Management 23.3 (2016): 345-361.

13TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Bibliography
International conventions and National Laws
Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights [TRIPS Agreement]
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works 1886
Implementing Regulation of the Trademark Law 2014
International Convention for the Protection of Industrial property (Paris Convention) 1989
Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks (Madrid Agreement)
The Nice Agreement 1957
The Protocol Relating to the Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of
Marks (Madrid Protocol)
Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China 2013
Trademark Treaties and International Law (TTIL) Committee
Case Citations
Michelin v Tan Guoqiang [2009]. Case No.0073
Victoria’s Secret v Shanghai Jin Tian [2013] E.I.P.R. 610
Journals
Baek, Young-Mi. "Current status of E-commerce market in China and implication." Journal of
Digital Convergence 13.1 (2015): 111-124.
Burmann, Christoph, et al. "Identity-Based Trademark Protection." Identity-Based Brand
Management. Springer Gabler, Wiesbaden, 2017. 281-289.
Cheung, Ming. "28. the e-commerce revolution: ensuring trust and consumer rights in
China." Handbook of Cultural and Creative Industries in China (2016): 412.

14TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Fang, Lily H., Josh Lerner, and Chaopeng Wu. "Intellectual property rights protection,
ownership, and innovation: Evidence from China." The Review of Financial Studies 30.7 (2017):
2446-2477.
Friedmann, Danny. "Protection against Abuse of Trademark Law in Greater China: A Brief
Analysis of the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan." Cal. W. Int'l
LJ 47 (2016): 157.
Giuffrida, Maria, et al. "Cross-border B2C e-commerce to Greater China and the role of
logistics: a literature review." International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics
Management 47.9 (2017): 772-795.
Li, Seth Siyuan, and Elena Karahanna. "Online recommendation systems in a B2C E-commerce
context: a review and future directions." Journal of the Association for Information Systems 16.2
(2015): 72.
Liu, Yongpei. "E-Commerce intellectual property rights protection in China." Intellectual
Property & Technology Law Journal 28.8 (2016): 14.
Luo, Kevin. "E-Commerce laws and practices in China." Ariz. J. Int'l & Comp. L. 33 (2016):
219.
Nica, Elvira. "Positive drivers of consumer trust in e-commerce." Journal of Self-Governance
and Management Economics 3.1 (2015): 60-65.
Turban, Efraim, et al. "Business-to-Business E-Commerce." Electronic Commerce 2018.
Springer, Cham, 2018. 123-166.
Turban, Efraim, et al. "E-Commerce: Regulatory, Ethical, and Social Environments." Electronic
Commerce 2018. Springer, Cham, 2018. 573-612.
Wilson, Jeremy M. "The future of brand protection: responding to the global risk." Journal of
Brand Management 24.3 (2017): 271-283.

15TRADEMARK PROTECTION AND E-COMMERCE
Wilson, Jeremy M., Clifford Grammich, and Fiona Chan. "Organizing for brand protection and
responding to product counterfeit risk: An analysis of global firms." Journal of Brand
Management 23.3 (2016): 345-361.
Books
Carpenter, Megan M. "Trademark Law Promotes Fair Competition, Not Morality." (2016).
Cheung, Ming, and Cheng-Fu Yang. "The e-commerce revolution: ensuring trust and consumer
rights in China." Applied System Innovation (ICASI), 2016 International Conference on. IEEE,
2016.
Fox, Robert. ". 中中 Domain Registration.-. 中中 General Information-. 中中 Brand Protection-China
domain registration." (2018).
Heath, Davidson, and Chris Mace. "What's a Brand Worth? Trademark Protection, Profits, and
Strategy." (2017).
Kotabe, Masaaki, and Kristiaan Helsen. Global marketing management. 2014.
Mitnick, David, Howard Greenstein, and Peter Kaminski. "System and method for onlne brand
protection and registry." U.S. Patent Application No. 14/692,180.
Mu, Xiao. The Evolution of Well-Known Trademark Protection in China. Diss. The University
of Manchester, 2016.
Nemeth, Charles P. Private security and the law. CRC Press, 2017.
Pras, Matthieu. "The use requirement for trademarks: a comparative study of the French,
European Union trademark and United States federal laws." (2016).