Just as parliamentarians voted to break for the summer, the Industry Committee (member list here) issued its report on counterfeiting and piracy, unambiguously titled Counterfeiting and Piracy are Theft. The report and its recommendations are stunning as they represent the most lopsided copyright related report since Sam Bulte chaired the […]
Canadian Heritage Memorandum, December 8, 2020, ATIP A-2020-00498
Bill C-10
Public Safety and National Security Committee Releases Counterfeiting Report
The Public Safety and National Security Committee has released its report on counterfeiting (I appeared before the committee in the spring). The report makes 14 recommendations, most of which unsurprisingly track the recommendations from the Canadian Anti-Counterfeiting Network. These include criminal remedies in the Trademarks Act, inclusion of copyright within […]
A Similar Plan
Today business and entertainment groups called on a government to address piracy and counterfeiting claiming that "our law enforcement resources are seriously misaligned. If you add up all the various kinds of property crimes in this country, everything from theft, to fraud, to burglary, bank-robbing, all of it, it costs the country $16 billion a year. But intellectual property crime runs to hundreds of billions [of dollars] a year." The groups unveiled a six-point plan that includes:
- increasing investigative and enforcement resources;
- strengthening enforcement of counterfeiting laws at borders;
- increasing penalties for trafficking in counterfeit and pirated goods;
- improving federal coordination of IP enforcement efforts;
- reforming civil and judicial processes to combat organized criminal trafficking; and
- consumer education.
The country?
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.
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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