New website will bring brands and law enforcement together to tackle the global threat from IP crime
The City of London Police’s Intellectual Property Crime Unit yesterday launched, Wednesday 26 April 2017, launching The IP Crime Directory.
The initiative is designed to boost the ability of law enforcement, both in the UK and internationally, to work directly with owners of intellectual property to identify, tackle and disrupt intellectual property crime, estimated to be worth £1.3 trillion globally (Intellectual Property Office – 2016).
The website is a secure database for customs and police officers to help them identify counterfeit goods with the information uploaded by rights and brand holders.
Information such as packaging details and other identifiers for counterfeit goods will be held on the website. Details of prior cases and contact points for brands will bring law enforcement and business closer to ensure law enforcement has the tools to take action immediately.
The site will also enable those signed up to create alerts that could warn brands and law enforcement about the latest trends in intellectual property crime.
Detective Chief Superintendent Glenn Maleary, Head of the Economic Crime Directorate at the City of London Police said.
“The key to tackling intellectual property crime is business and law enforcement working together to take action against criminals who undermine not only the UK economy, but economies worldwide.
“The Intellectual Property Crime Directory will help bring more criminals to justice, reduce the amount of dangerous fake goods in circulation and give confidence to the consumer that what they are buying is the genuine product.
Sir Richard Branson, Virgin Group Founder, said
“It’s essential that swift action is taken against criminals that commit intellectual property crime. In the last year, we have dealt with more than 130 instances of me being impersonated, fake pages, misleading ads and false endorsements.
“I am determined to protect my followers and Virgin customers from being misled. We need to prevent anyone being confused into giving money or their personal information away. I would urge everyone to keep reporting these scams.”
Dr Ros Lynch, Director of Copyright and Enforcement, Intellectual Property Office said:
“I welcome the launch of the Intellectual Property Crime Directory. This innovative collaboration by rights holders and brand owners is key to helping customs and police officers identify counterfeit goods and take immediate action to tackle IP criminals and disrupt their operations.”
The website will only be open to registered brands and trade bodies. For more information on how you can sign up please go to www.ipcrimedirectory.org
Any profits made from the directory will be reinvested into the fight against intellectual property crime by the City of London Police.
World Intellectual Property Day takes place every year on April 26th. For more information please go to http://www.wipo.int/ip-outreach/en/ipday/
The Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit is a specialist national police unit dedicated to protecting the UK industries that produce legitimate, high quality, physical goods and online and digital content from intellectual property crime.
The operationally independent unit was launched in September 2013 with funding from the Intellectual Property. Office.
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