Study On Trademark Infringement Under Search-Engine 'Sponsored Link'

'Sponsored Link'is an emerging pattern of network marketing. The company who first introduced this system to China is Baidu. Than, Google also commenced this system, named"AdWords". Under the AdWords Program, Google offers an advertiser the ability to select certain words or phrases('keywords')that, combined with the advertisement's quality and the maximum bid price for the advertisement, will trigger a Sponsored Link to the Advertiser's chosen website. This service on one hand, brings considerable income, on the other hand, induces a lot of commercial crises, such as malicious clicks, deceptive advertising and so on.This paper thus seeks to determine and analyze the components of the trademark infringement framework concering the liability of search engines running advertising services and thereby to underline the ambiguities of search engines' liability regimes as they derive from various cases among China, US and EU.This paper is composed of perface, text and conclusion. While the text is devied into three parts.The first part mainly focuses upon the relevant cases in China, US, EU and Taiwan District of China, and the relative law of those cases. The two main controversy points are'ues in commerce'and'likelihood of confusion'which will be discussed in the next parts.The second part determines the nature of'Sponsored Link'. It reveals the orgin and sorts of transformation style of this system. Depending on some data, make a conclusion that this service is essentially an Internet advertising. The third part examines the commponents of trademark infrigement under China, US and European law.Through comparision of two main points that mentioned above in US and European cases , it is necessary to complete the commponents of trademark infrigement in China which lacks of practical experience. Apart from this, the debate of'indirect liability'theory is aslo analysed.The conclusion reviews the main opinions of this paper, including the legal status of Google and Baidu's liability, reviewing obligation of search engine corporations and other judicial suggestion in practical area.