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ARTICLE · 18 JUNE 2020

Google Goes Organic To Fight Counterfeiters

In the midst of the global pandemic, Google has provided some welcome news in the ongoing fight against counterfeiters.

CanadaIntellectual Property

In the midst of the global pandemic, Google has provided some welcome news in the ongoing fight against counterfeiters.

Google recently updated its legal complaint system to allow trademark owners to report webpages that sell or promote the sale of counterfeit goods, and has committed to removing the webpages from the search engine's organic (non-advertisement) results.

Google has long prohibited ads that promote the sale of counterfeit goods and has provided a complaint system to report violations.

However, Google has historically refused to remove organic search results without a court order. This allowed links to counterfeit sellers to persist in organic search results. A 2019 study by Incopro that analysed search results across five industries-pharmaceuticals, car parts, children's products, white goods, and safety equipment-concluded that up to 60% of results returned by search engines led to sites that sold counterfeits or otherwise infringed on IP

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