"Unfair Competition Law" Overhaul Unfair Competition Or Be Punished By Sky High Price

Recently, SAIC has completed.

The current anti unfair competition law was promulgated and implemented in 1993.

However, over time,

Scope expansion

An expert who was involved in the drafting of the revised edition revealed that the revision of the anti unfair competition law can be described as a major overhaul. One of the major changes is the expansion of the scope of unfair competition.

The revised draft has enriched the connotation of unfair competition.

Previously, it was illegal to use the name, packaging or decoration of well-known commodities without authorization, or to use similar names, packages and decorations with well-known commodities, resulting in confusion with well-known products of others.

The revised edition expanded the illegal activities to unauthorized use of domain name, enterprise name, short name, short name, name and so on.

This means expanding the scope of protection of commercial labels. As long as there is a certain commercial mark of a certain degree of visibility, whether it is counterfeit with similar or heterogeneous commercial signs, as long as it is enough to cause buyer's mistaken recognition, it belongs to market confusion and constitutes unfair competition.

The 11 acts listed in the current anti unfair competition law are defined as unfair competition.

However, due to the fact that unfair competition is constantly being renovated with changes in the market environment, the formulation and revision of laws and regulations need to be carried out through strict procedures and for a long time. This leads to the emergence of new unfair competition activities that can not be incorporated into the scope of the existing law.

Shi Jichun, a professor at the Law School of Renmin University of China, said that in order to overcome the lagging nature of legislation, the anti unfair competition law in most countries stipulates specific provisions that can summarize the general characteristics of all unfair competition behaviors, which are called "General Provisions".

To this end, apart from enumerating specific acts of unfair competition, the revised version defines unfair competition as a violation of the provisions of the preceding paragraph, damaging the legitimate rights and interests of other operators or consumers and disrupting social and economic order.

And the recognition of the general provisions shall be granted to the SAIC.

Clear the main body of law enforcement

The main body of law enforcement is also a major change in the revision of the law.

According to the current "Anti Unfair Competition Law", other departments other than the industrial and commercial administrative departments such as quality inspection, price, health, construction, culture and so on may also exercise the supervisory power over unfair competition activities.

At the same time, this provision in the anti unfair competition law has also left a gap for other laws and regulations promulgated hereafter.

For example, the following laws and regulations, such as the insurance law, the tendering and bidding law, and other laws and regulations, have resulted in the conflict between the anti unfair competition law and other relevant laws and regulations in the main body of law enforcement.

On this issue, the revised regulations stipulate that the administrative departments for Industry and commerce under the State Council and local administrative departments for Industry and commerce are the supervision and inspection departments of unfair competition. They shall supervise and inspect unfair competition activities in accordance with this law.

In addition to defining the law enforcement department, the revised version also authorizes the State Council administrative department for Industry and commerce to identify the rights of other unfair competition activities.

China University of Political Science and Law professor Wu Jingming believes that the revised version not only unified the main body of law enforcement, but also unified the scale of law enforcement, which is conducive to enhancing the enforcement of unfair competition.

Increase penalties

In practice, the weak enforcement means and ineffective administrative measures have always been the weakness of the anti unfair competition law.

The current "Anti Unfair Competition Law" stipulates that the penalty for the implementation of unfair competition shall be ten thousand yuan or less than 200 thousand yuan or more than 3 times the illegal income.

Wu Jingming believes that a fine of 200 thousand yuan is far from the current law enforcement needs, and it is difficult to form an effective deterrent against some illegal and lucrative unfair competition behaviors.

At the same time, the determination of "illegal gains" is a difficult problem in law enforcement.

In the revised version, the fines for the operators who have implemented unfair competition will be greatly increased, and a fine of up to 2 million yuan or more than 5 times the illegal income shall be imposed.

Wu Jingming believes that in the past, when it was difficult to identify illegal gains, enterprises faced a fine of up to 200 thousand yuan, but now the maximum penalty has increased by 10 times.

When the illegal income is identified, it will face a penalty of up to 5 times.

This has greatly increased the cost of operators' unfair competition.

Although the current "Anti Unfair Competition Law" stipulates the right of supervision and inspection of anti unfair competition law enforcement departments, however, due to the lack of coercive means such as detention, seizure and forcible pfer, law enforcement departments have not done enough enforcement in investigating cases of unfair competition.

The revised regulations stipulate that when supervising and inspecting unfair competition activities, the supervision and inspection departments shall have the right to seal up or seize the property and evidence that are suspected of unfair competition, and to seal up the sites suspected of unfair competition. At the same time, they can check the bank accounts of the inspected operators and notify the banks to suspend payment of their deposits. If the investigation by law enforcement departments is conducted according to law, it is not enough to provide relevant materials or do not cooperate with the investigation to refuse or obstruct the investigation. If the circumstances are serious, a fine of 20 thousand yuan and 100 thousand yuan shall be imposed on the unit, and the unit shall be fined not less than 200 thousand yuan or less than 1 million yuan.