Patent Office Technology Police Play Key Role in Responding to 'Intellectual Property Crimes'

The dedicated organization for intellectual property crime and administrative investigations (hereinafter referred to as the dedicated organization) is playing a prominent role in responding to intellectual property crimes. The dedicated organization was newly established within the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) to respond to increasingly sophisticated and intelligent intellectual property crimes.

According to KIPO on the 26th, the dedicated organization is divided into the Technology Police Division, Trademark Police Division, and Unfair Competition Investigation Team.

These organizations were established in July 2021 to prevent the leakage of key technologies, which are core to national industrial competitiveness, as well as intellectual property infringement and unfair competition acts.

In the two years since its launch, a total of 13,410 cases of intellectual property infringement have been reported to the dedicated organization. Based on the reports received, the dedicated organization has criminally charged 1,689 individuals and conducted 256 administrative investigations.

First, the Technology Police Division responded to intellectual property infringement through investigations of technology crimes, criminally charging 760 individuals. Notably, since its launch, the Technology Police Division has sounded the alarm on technology crimes by indicting and detaining six suspects involved in the overseas leakage of national core semiconductor technologies.

The Trademark Police Division focused on cracking down on counterfeit goods transactions, which frequently occur both online and offline. As a result, over the past two years, the Trademark Police Division has seized approximately 450,000 counterfeit items worth 84.09 billion KRW in genuine product value.

Additionally, by expanding planned investigations targeting sellers of counterfeit goods and manufacturers and large-scale distributors of counterfeit products that threaten public safety and health, they are leading efforts to eradicate the distribution of counterfeit goods in the market.

The Unfair Competition Investigation Team is responsible for intensively cracking down on cases such as the unauthorized use of widely known trademarks or trade names of others for unfair purposes and conducting administrative investigations. In particular, last year, a total of 152 cases of unfair competition were reported, marking the highest number of cases received and processed since the implementation of the investigation and corrective recommendation system in 2017.

Earlier, when establishing the dedicated organization, KIPO expanded and reorganized the existing Industrial Property Investigation Division by specialty fields and strengthened investigative and investigative personnel to enhance the role of the dedicated organization.

Lee In-sil, Commissioner of KIPO, said, “The fact that the three dedicated organizations have led intellectual property crime investigations and inquiries within two years of their launch is thanks to the expertise of KIPO’s investigators and inspectors,” adding, “KIPO will continue efforts to improve systems for prompt and effective damage relief.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.