Post Tagged with: "Counterfeit"

Oda Commits Millions to New Media

Canadian Heritage Minister Bev Oda used the digital media conference at Banff to announce that Ottawa will spend $29 million over the next two years to fund new media.

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June 10, 2007 1 comment News

G8 Set To Adopt Maximalist IP Agenda

While climate change has dominated the discussion at the G8 meeting in Germany, the summit document includes an ambitious intellectual property agenda.  There is the usual talk linking stronger IP to greater innovation and the prospect of greater international IP cooperation and enforcement (as well as an IPR Task Force), yet also noteworthy is an agenda that responds to WIPO and OECD initiatives. 

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June 7, 2007 Comments are Disabled News

Yet More Committee Hearings on Counterfeiting

Two Canadian hearings on counterfeiting in one month is apparently not enough.  The Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights last week passed a motion to conduct hearings on counterfeiting and movie camcording.  The Chair of the Committee acknowledged that it would be good to actually see the reports from […]

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May 18, 2007 Comments are Disabled News

OECD Finds Global Counterfeiting Costs Far Lower Than Claimed

I referenced this report in my posting on Warner Bros., but it merits specific mention as a must-read.  The Financial Times reports that the OECD is about to release a report on the impact of global counterfeiting and piracy.  It places the impact at $200 billion annually, a far cry […]

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May 8, 2007 Comments are Disabled News

GAO Study Contradicts Counterfeit Claims: My Appearance before the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology

I appeared before the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology on Wednesday to discuss counterfeiting (following on my appearance last week before the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security).  My opening remarks are posted below – they focused primarily on the need to obtain more accurate data (I cited the inconsistent data associated with camcording) and to separate the counterfeiting issue from copyright reform (I argued that the inclusion of issues such as ratification of the WIPO Internet treaties is hampering progress on the serious counterfeiting problems).

Interestingly, just after the hearing I was alerted to a new U.S. study [PDF] from the Government Accountability Office on U.S. border enforcement activities against counterfeiting.  The report is a must-read for people focused on this issue as it highlights two very important things.  First, notwithstanding the claims that Canada must dramatically reform the powers afforded to our border services to address counterfeiting, the GAO study demonstrates that even countries like the U.S. are struggling with this issue as it points to a lack of data and coordination within the U.S.

Second, the data contained in the GAO report suggests that the claims associated with counterfeiting are massively overstated.  The Industry Committee previously heard from witnesses who noted that there have claims that 5 to 7 percent of world trade involves counterfeit products (some even argue that is growing).  The GAO study points to the U.S. Compliance Measure Program, a statistical sampling program, that randomly selects shipments to check for their compliance with the law, including IP laws.  Of 287,000 inspected shipments from 2000 – 2005, IP violations were only found in 0.06 percent of shipments – less than one tenth of one percent.  This large random sample suggests that counterfeit products are actually only found in a tiny percentage of shipments.  Moreover, the GAO notes that despite increases in IP seizures, the value of those seizures in 2005 represented only 0.02 percent of the total value of imports of goods in product categories that are likely to involve IP protection.  In other words, the evidence from an independent, U.S. government sponsored agency points to a far different reality from that presented to the two parliamentary committees investigating counterfeiting.

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May 3, 2007 3 comments Committees, News