Legal Question in Intellectual Property in New Jersey

A company is accusing my company of being an infringer of their Unregistered Design Rights. My response was that "An unregistered design is not enforceable under the law, so a design must therefore be registered in order to enjoy protection. Please show where consumers have been deceived or misled to believe that the brands are connected."

They themselves have also been to court for the exact same thing they are accusing us of.

They then send an old DMCA takedown to Shopify that has broken links because it is old as in years old and have not responded to my further communication.

Is this harassment B2B?


Asked on 4/20/22, 2:28 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

Roman Fichman Esq. Law Practice of Roman Fichman Esq.

Generally speaking, under certain circumstances unregistered designs may in fact be protected under the law and thus enforceable.

Complaints to third party platform providers, such as Shopify, need to be handled with the untmost seriousness because such platforms do not adjudicate claims, rather they tend to take the safe approach (from their point of view) and suspend the the party against whom a complaint was made and have that party sort it out. Nonetheless, companies accused of breach of intellectual property rights under the DMCA do have recourse under the DMCA and typically there is a specific timeline that the accused company needs to follow in order to continue operations on the platform.

In addition as you pointed out, if the other company has purposely filed baseless accusations, to de-platform your company and harm it, then there are causes of action that may be relevant for a lawsuit such as unfair business competition, fraud in the inducement and fraudulent business practices, trade libel, and tortious interference with a business, to name just a few.

I would to examine the other company's specific allegations and your responses to date, to be able to reccomend a course of action. Please contact me directly


Roman R. Fichman, Esq.

www.TheLegalist.com

email: Info (@) TheLegalist (dot) com


Disclaimer: This post has been written for educational purposes only and was not meant to be legal advice and should not be construed as legal advice or be relied upon. No intention exists to create an attorney-client relationship or any other special relationship or privilege through this post. The post may contain errors, inaccuracies and/or omissions. You should always consult an attorney admitted to practice in your jurisdiction for specific advice. This post may be deemed as Attorney Advertising.

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Answered on 4/21/22, 6:41 am


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