Tag: Counterfeit Goods Act

We see it weekly in the news. Headlines like “South African National Anti-Counterfeit Task Force seizes counterfeit goods worth R100 million, suspects arrested” capture attention. However, what happens to these suspects after their arrests and charges?

South African intellectual property (IP) legislation includes the Trademarks Act, Patents Act, Designs Act, Copyright Act and Plant Breeder's Rights Act. Each piece of legislation dealing with the particular IP right concerned, but is it all fit for purpose? 

The considerable diversion of consumers from shopping malls to online trading platforms, further driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, presents huge challenges to authorities in stopping unlawful goods from being distributed. Amazon took welcome initiative last year when they filed two separate joint US law suits with Valentino and KF Beauty against 4 companies and 16 individuals for selling counterfeit versions of the last mentioned copied products on Amazon’s market place website.