Report on the EU internal market enforcement of intellectual property rights

December 17, 2020 General

Report on the EU internal market enforcement of intellectual property rights

In September 2019, the EUIPO published the ‘Report on the EU enforcement of intellectual property rights: results at EU borders and in Member States 2013-2017’, containing an analysis of detentions both at the EU borders and within the EU internal market, and providing information about related trends for that period.

Following up on that report, the EUIPO is now publishing this ‘Report on the EU internal market enforcement of intellectual property rights: results of detentions in EU Member States, 2019’, produced from the analysis of the 2019 data on detentions in national markets, as reported through the IP Enforcement Portal by the enforcement authorities of 25 different Member States’. It also contains, as baseline for comparison, the 2018 data. It aims to provide useful information to support the analysis of IPR infringements in the EU and the development, by the relevant enforcement authorities, of appropriate countermeasures, since the figures allow for a better understanding of the scope and extent of the problem.

  • According to figures reported by police, customs and market surveillance authorities in the EU internal market, the annual number of IPR-infringing items reported as detained in 2019 (40 million) decreased compared to 2018 (70 million).
  • Despite the large reduction in the number of items detained, the estimated value of the reported items detained in the EU internal market remained almost unchanged in 2019 (EUR 1.8 billion) compared to 2018.
  • Of the top four product subcategories identified, Clothing accessories was the leader, both in terms of the number of items reported as detained within the EU and in terms of their estimated value.

The report’s publication coincides with that of the ‘Report on the EU customs enforcement of intellectual property rights: results at EU border, 2019’ by DG TAXUD, available on their website. The two reports complement each other, together presenting the results of all the detentions of counterfeited goods across the EU in 2019.

All Observatory publications, including this report, can be found on the Observatory website.