The Study Of The Contributory Trademark Infringement In Online Marketplace

As shopping online has become one of the most common ways that people use internet, plenty of online marketplaces blossom, which brings about a lot of legal problems related. The contributory trademark infringement has been one of the focuses that researchers and legislators concerned about. The trademark infringement happened in online marketplaces influences both trademark owners’ goodwill and customers’ rights. Except for pursuing the direct infringers, the trademark owners set their sight on the online marketplace operators, which becomes one of remedies protecting the owners from losses. However, the specialty to judge the trademark infringement, the imperfection of the contributory infringement rules and the complexity of the internet environment leads to different judgements of similar cases. Thus, it becomes a pressing problem to determine under which circumstances the online marketplace operators should bear the contributory liability.The article has 4 sections. Section 1 raises the questions in the research of trademark contributory infringement of online marketplace in China. There are 3 parts. Part 1 recommends the current legislation and rules related. Part 2 proposes academic questions in judging “subjective fault” of online marketplace and puts forward two practical problems in judicial practice, namely the notice effectiveness in “notice and take-down rule” and the judgement of requisite measures. Section 2 answers the questions raised in early passages. Part 1 discusses the online marketplaces’ subjective faults. Part 2 focuses on the origin and types of online marketplaces’ reasonable obligation.Section 3 and Section 4 are about the suggestions to establish the contributory trademark infringement theory of the online trade platform, which will respectively answer the questions raised in Section 1, combined with the judicial experience both domestic and abroad.