On February 14, 2022, the Beijing Press Center held a special press conference on comprehensively strengthening the protection of intellectual property rights in the Winter Olympics, and the relevant responsible persons of the State Intellectual Property Office, the National Copyright Administration, the State Administration for Market Supervision and Administration, and the Beijing Municipal Intellectual Property Office introduced the situation and answered questions from reporters. Xu Hejian, director of the Beijing Information Center and spokesman of the Beijing Municipal People's Government, presided over the press conference.
Zhang Zhicheng, spokesperson of the State Intellectual Property Office and director of the Department of Intellectual Property Protection, introduced in his speech that the intellectual property rights related to the Olympic Games carry the Olympic culture and interpret the Olympic spirit, and are the precious wealth of the Olympic movement. Doing a good job in the protection of intellectual property rights in the Winter Olympics is an important measure to create a good atmosphere for the Games and ensure the smooth holding of the Games. The Regulations on the Protection of Olympic Symbols promulgated by the State Council in 2002 played an important role in the smooth hosting of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. In 2018, the Chinese government improved and revised the regulations to further include the relevant symbols of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in the scope of protection. Up to now, the State Intellectual Property Office has issued public protection for 63 Olympic symbols, promoted the timely disclosure of licensee information, and protected 14 patent applications and 315 trademark applications submitted by the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee. The National Copyright Administration has opened a green channel for copyright registration and protection for the Winter Olympics, providing fast and convenient copyright services for Olympic-related copyright works. Like the ice piers that are now "difficult to find", they are protected by the Olympic symbol, but also by patents, trademarks and copyrights, which can be said to be wearing both a crystal clear "ice sugar shell" and a tight and invisible "intellectual property protection cover". The all-round and three-dimensional intellectual property protection network has effectively protected the legitimate rights and interests of right holders, and also promoted the dissemination and promotion of olympic culture and spirit.
The State Intellectual Property Office and the State Administration of Market Regulation deployed in advance to issue the "Special Action Plan for the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights of olympic symbols of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Winter Olympic Games". The National Copyright Administration and the Central Radio and Television Corporation released the "Copyright Protection Plan" for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, and together with the Cyberspace Administration of China and other 6 departments, set up an anti-piracy working group for the Winter Olympics to jointly carry out centralized copyright protection actions for the Winter Olympics. Organizations throughout the country, especially in Beijing and Hebei, have carried out in-depth special actions to comprehensively investigate and severely crack down on Austria-related infringements and violations. Establish an emergency duty mechanism for intellectual property protection linked by the central government and the local government, timely discover clues, share information, and deal with problems, and crack down on violations of Olympic intellectual property rights with a "zero tolerance" attitude. The high level of intellectual property protection is the greatest respect for every athlete who works hard, the best incentive for every Olympic innovation and technology, the best promotion and dissemination of every wonderful and fierce event, and the interpretation and guarantee of the Olympic spirit of "faster, higher, stronger and more united".
During the reporter's question session, Tang Zhaozhi, deputy director of the Copyright Administration Bureau of the Central Propaganda Department (first-level inspector), introduced the protection of intellectual property rights in the Winter Olympics.
First, the gate is moved forward, and the pressure is transmitted layer by layer. Before the Winter Olympics, the National Copyright Administration strengthened the social co-governance pattern of copyright protection in the Winter Olympics. On January 29, the National Copyright Administration announced the "Early Warning List of Copyright Protection of the First Batch of Key Works in 2022", which publicized the rights holders of programs related to the Winter Olympics and the Winter Paralympic Games and the network service providers that obtained the right to disseminate information networks, requiring all network platforms to strengthen early warning protection, improve the duty of care, improve complaint channels, strengthen the joint control mechanism, strictly manage users, cooperate with the investigation and handling of cases, and build a co-governance pattern of copyright protection in the Winter Olympics with progressive and orderly levels.
The second is to serve first and open up green channels. The National Copyright Administration and the Organizing Committee of the Winter Olympics strengthened the linkage, coordinated relevant units, and opened a green channel for copyright registration and protection of the Winter Olympics for the first time, providing fast and convenient work platform support for the confirmation, authorization and protection of copyright-related works, including integrated copyright services such as registration and certification, work display, and authorization information inquiry.
The third is to dredge up and block at the same time and deploy special actions. In late January, the National Copyright Administration, together with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, and the Cyberspace Administration of China, jointly launched a two-month concentrated action on copyright protection for the Winter Olympics. On the one hand, concentrated action focuses on rectifying the illegal dissemination of Winter Olympic programs through radio and television, websites (APP), IPTV, Internet television and other platforms, focusing on cracking down on short video platforms and public accounts providing unauthorized links to the pirated broadcast of Winter Olympic programs, centralized batch uploading and dissemination of Winter Olympic programs on network platforms, and the unauthorized dissemination of Winter Olympic programs by network anchors in live broadcasts; on the other hand, concentrated actions have strengthened key websites (APP) such as e-commerce platforms. Copyright inspections in key markets such as key areas such as the periphery of competition venues, commodity production concentrations, and sales distribution centers, severely crack down on all kinds of infringement and piracy of audiovisual, text, fine arts, music, and other works related to the Winter Olympics, and focus on rectifying the illegal acts of producing and selling infringing pirated derivatives related to the Winter Olympics. At present, the special action is steadily advancing.
The fourth is to improve the mechanism and accelerate the response to the event. The National Copyright Administration and other six departments have formed an anti-piracy working group for the Winter Olympics to strengthen organizational coordination, close work convergence, and strengthen regulatory synergy. In view of the rapid dissemination of audio and video related to the Olympic Games and the high frequency of sharing, a special anti-piracy work class and an anti-piracy rapid response and disposal mechanism during the Winter Olympic Games have been specially established, and a 7×24-hour working mechanism has been adopted to immediately investigate the key infringement clues complained by the International Olympic Committee, the Winter Olympic Organizing Committee, the right holders and other rights holders, and have been dealt with quickly and strictly in accordance with the law, and positive results have been achieved.
Wang Songlin, deputy director of the Law Enforcement Inspection Bureau of the State Administration for Market Regulation, introduced the investigation and handling of cases of intellectual property infringement in the market supervision of the Olympic Games. Judging from the cases investigated and handled, the illegal acts are mainly concentrated in three aspects:
The first is to use the Olympic symbol on the product without the permission of the right holder. For example, in the case of Nanjing Municipal Bureau of Market Supervision investigating and handling the sale of masks that infringed on the exclusive right to the Olympic symbol, the parties sold masks printed with five ring patterns in their online stores, and there were also brush lists and false publicity of the mask protection level, and the Nanjing Municipal Market Supervision Bureau confiscated the infringing masks and imposed a fine of more than 240,000 yuan.
The second is the use of olympic symbols in advertising without the permission of the right holder. For example, in the case of Aorun Real Estate Development Co., Ltd., which was investigated and punished by the Market Supervision Bureau of Ma'anshan City, Anhui Province, for infringing on the exclusive right to the Olympic symbol, and the parties planned and published commercial advertisements containing words such as "Olympic Games" and "Olympics", the Ma'anshan Municipal Market Supervision Bureau ordered the parties to immediately stop the infringement and imposed a fine of 210,000 yuan.
The third is to use the Olympic symbol in the content published on the website without the permission of the right holder. For example, in the case of Fuling Juice Group Co., Ltd. of Chongqing Fuling District Market Supervision Bureau for infringing on the exclusive rights of the Olympic symbol, the parties published promotional pictures containing Olympic content on their official Weibo, and the Fuling District Market Supervision Bureau ordered the parties to immediately stop the infringement and fined 150,000 yuan.
In response to a question from a reporter from China Net, "There are many pictures and derivatives related to Austria on the Internet and offline, the copyright situation is complicated, and what work results the National Copyright Administration has achieved in anti-piracy", Tang Zhaozhi, deputy director of the Copyright Administration Bureau of the Central Propaganda Department (first-level inspector), introduced. Now that the Winter Olympics have passed the halfway point of view, from the perspective of network monitoring data, the protection work has basically achieved the expected results. As of 00:00 on February 12, 27 major video, social, live broadcast and search engine platforms such as Youku, iQiyi, Tencent Video, Sina Weibo, B Station, Douyin, Baidu, etc., deleted 32,376 infringing links related to the Winter Olympics after receiving notice from various rights holders; in accordance with the requirements of the Winter Olympics Anti-Piracy Working Group composed of six departments including the National Copyright Administration, 227452 links related to the Winter Olympics were actively deleted through self-examination; and 3,363 accounts of various types were disposed of by various platforms due to the dissemination of infringing content related to the Winter Olympics. On this basis, 39 overseas illegal websites were closed, and 52 domestic websites (APP) suspected of illegally disseminating content related to the Winter Olympics were disposed of in accordance with the law. At the same time, we have also strengthened the investigation and handling of traditional infringement and piracy. Recently, in a case of production and sale of pirated Winter Olympic mascot ice piers and snow rongrong dolls, the criminal suspect Ren Was sentenced to one year in prison and fined 40,000 yuan, becoming the first criminal case in China to infringe the copyright of the image of the Beijing Winter Olympics mascot.