Fact sheet – What the Combating Counterfeit Products Act Means
The Combating Counterfeit Products Act provides trademark and copyright owners with a clear framework for combating counterfeiting in today's environment. It will help Canadian businesses protect their brands and works and will ensure they are fairly compensated.
Key provisions include the following:
New border regime: The Bill will create a system to allow trademark and copyright owners to submit a "request for assistance" to the Canada Border Services Agency. Through this system, rights holders would request that border officers detain commercial shipments suspected of containing counterfeit goods, thus enabling the trademark owner to begin civil proceedings in court. To support this process, border officers will be further authorized to furnish certain information about shipments and their importers to the rights holders. Rights holders wishing to take part in the "request for assistance" system will assume certain costs associated with shipments being detained by border officers.
New civil causes of action: The Bill will allow trademark owners to seek legal recourse before counterfeit trademark goods are sold in the marketplace. Specifically, rights holders will be able to seek civil remedies for the manufacture, distribution and possession with intent to sell counterfeit goods.
New criminal offences: The Bill will ensure that selling, distributing, possessing, importing or exporting counterfeit goods for the purpose of trade will be prohibited and subject to fines and possible jail time. In addition, new criminal offences for possessing and exporting counterfeit goods for the purpose of trade will be added to the Copyright Act, which would allow the RCMP to seize counterfeit goods.
You may download the whole text at HERE. 