China National Intellectual Property Administration issued Standard of Judgement on Trademark’s Generally Illegal Acts, to make further stipulations on the infringement of trademarks in terms of the use, judgement of infringement, exception, suspension of application, conflict of right, for the application by the trademark law enforcement authority to investigate cases trademark infringement, the standard will be put into use since January 2022. Hereon, applicants are advised to pay attention to notices below during the application and use of the trademark, through the analysis and study of the standard, with combination of consultations in the daily work.

I.Regarding Article 15 of the Standard: Prohibition of use after the violation of Article 10 prohibition of registration of the Trademark Law 

1.Marks whose registration and use are prohibited by the Trademark Office shall be used. 

Where a trademark is rejected by China National Intellectual Property Administration for misidentification or adverse effects as set out in Article 10 of the Trademark Law, the applicant should not be allowed to use the trademark any more upon it has been rejected. We advise all applicants to check the trademark under their name and see if there is any violation of Article 10 of the Trademark Law. Special attention should be paid to Article 10 (7) (8) of the Trademark Law, because the examination standard of the Trademark Office for the misidentification and adverse effects will change with the social atmosphere and habits over a period of time, if the applicant has uncertain trademark names, it is recommended to find professional agents for the analysis and suggestions. 

 Marks below are not allowed to be used as trademark as per Article 10 of Trademark Law

(1)Those are identical to or similar with the country’s name, national flag, national emblem, national anthem, military flag, military emblem, medals of the People’s Republic of China, as well as those are identical to or similar with the names and logos of central national organs, also, identical or similar names and graphs of special location or landmark buildings. 

(2)Those are identical to or similar with the foreign country’s name, national flag, national emblem, miliary flag, however, exception for the approval of the government. 

(3)Those are identical to or similar with inter-governmental organization’s name, flag, emblem, however, exception for the ones approved by the organization or ones are not easy mislead the public. 

(4)Those are identical to or similar with official marks and inspection logos that indicating the exercise of control and granting the protection, however, exception for the authorization. 

(5)Those are identical to or similar with ‘red cross’, ‘red crescent’

(6)Those are being discriminatory against any nation.

(7)Those are being deceitful and easy to cause the public to misidentify the quality or other features of a goods or the place of origin. 

(8)Those harmful to socialist morals, customs, or having other adverse effects. 

II.Regarding ‘Processing Illegal Publicity of Well-known Trademark’ of Article 17 of the Standard

1.‘Well-known trademark’ should not be labelled in the business activity. Even if the applicant has already been identified as well-known trademark, the words ‘well-known trademark’ may not be marked in the design of trademark. 

III.Regarding ‘Changing the definition of registered trademark on its own’ of Article 18 of the Standard 

1.When using a registered trademark, the applicant must keep consistent with the one on the registration certificate, and the applicant shall not alter the design of the trademark optionally, such as ordering, changing the font of a trademark or removing a part from a trademark combination. 

IV.Regarding ‘Changing the registered issues of a trademark on intendedly’ of Article 20 of the Standard 

1.After changes of the trademark applicant’s name and address, and they did not apply for the changes to China National Intellectual Property Administration, or the name of the registrant who actually uses the registered trademark is inconsistent with that recorded in the trademark registered book. 

Before the issuance of the standard, some applicants have changed the name and address, considering that it will not affect the use of the trademark, thus, did not file the corresponding change application to the Trademark Office, however, Article 41 of the Trademark Law has stipulated that it is necessary to change the nominal address of the registrant of a registered trademark or other registered issues, a corresponding application should be filed. Therefore, it is recommended that applicants whose name and address have been changed apply should file application to the Trademark Office as soon as possible, in order to deal with the inspection after implementation of the standards. 

V.Regarding ‘False Registered Trademark’ of Article 23 of the Standards

1.An unregistered trademark is not allowed to use as a registered trademark

There are cases of unregistered trademarks: (1) those are not filed application for registration to the Trademark Office. (2) those are rejected after filed to the Trademark Office. (3) Those are not obtaining the registered certificate and still in the period of the application. (4) Those are expired and have not been renewed. (5) Those are revoked (6) Those are beyond the range of approved goods of the registered trademark. 

The above is the trademark in the use of the illegal behavior, it is recommended to consult the agent timely if there are any other uncertain issues.