Acts of infringing upon intellectual property rights are detailed in Articles 28, 35, 126, 127, 129 and 188 of the Vietnam Intellectual Property Law. Accordingly, in order to determine whether an act is considered an infringement of intellectual property rights under the above provisions, we must consider whether the act meets the grounds specified in Article 72 Decree No. 65/2023/NĐ-CP.

Acts are considered infringements on industrial property rights and rights to plant varieties according to Articles 126, 127, 129, and 188 of the Law on Intellectual Property when the following grounds are found:

– The subject in consideration falls into the scope of subjects under protection;

– There are elements of infringement in the subject in consideration;

– The person who commits the act that is in consideration is not the holder of industrial property rights or rights to plant varieties and is not a person permitted by laws or a competent authority according to Clause 2 and Clause 3 Article 125, Article 133, Clause 3 Article 133a, Article 134, Clause 2 Article 137, Article 145, Article 190, and Article 195 of the Law on Intellectual Property;

– The act in consideration takes place in Vietnam.  The act will also be considered to take place in Vietnam if it occurs on the Internet and is carried out on an information website under a Vietnamese domain name or with the display language of Vietnamese or aims at consumers or information users in Vietnam.

Protection of industrial property rights is to protect the Law, to ensure the observance of laws, ordinances and legal documents in the field of industrial property. These acts of protection aim to ensure that the provisions of the law governing industrial property are properly implemented and take effect, and to protect the legitimate rights and interests of the State and of the society as well as the rights holder.

Industrial property objects being protected are assets of enterprises and individuals recognized by law.

Protect industrial property rights to fulfill international rights and obligations. Vietnam has ratified numerous trade agreements as well as numerous international treaties on intellectual property. Vietnam is already a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The content of these documents, especially the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), all stipulate the responsibilities of the parties to the implementation of the committed provisions, which ensures the protection of industrial property rights of organizations and individuals who are the rights holders in Vietnam.

The right to self-protection is the right of industrial property rights holders to apply various measures to protect their industrial property rights, according to Article 198 of the Law on Intellectual Property including:

• Apply technological measures to protect rights, provide rights management information or apply other technological measures to prevent intellectual property rights infringement;
• Require organizations and individuals that violate intellectual property rights to stop the infringement, remove and delete infringing content on the telecommunications network and Internet environment, apologize, and make public corrections. declare and compensate for damages;
• Request competent state agencies to handle acts of infringement of intellectual property rights according to the provisions of this Law and other relevant laws;
• File a lawsuit in court or arbitration to protect your legitimate rights and interests. Request competent state agencies to handle acts of infringement of industrial property rights.

When the violating party commits an intentional or unintentional fault, but not to the extent that it is considered dangerous or not to the extent that it is determined as a crime, and these acts are specified in the related administrative handling documents on property rights such as: Law on handling of administrative violations, Decree 99/2013/ND-CP Regulations on handling of administrative violations in the field of industrial property…

Acts of infringing upon intellectual property rights as prescribed in Article 211 of the Law on Intellectual Property including:

• Infringement of intellectual property rights causing damage to authors, owners, consumers or society;
• Producing, importing, transporting, trading in counterfeit intellectual property goods specified in Article 213 of this Law or assigning others to perform this act;
• Producing, importing, transporting, trading, storing stamps, labels or other articles bearing counterfeit trademarks or geographical indications or assigning others to commit this act.

When detecting acts of infringing upon intellectual property rights, organizations, individuals and rights holders request specialized inspectorate or authorities such as market management, district-level People’s Committees or higher to be processed.

According to the provisions of Clause 2, Article 71 of Decree 65/2023/ND-CP, administrative measures shall be applied to handle any act of infringement that falls into one of the cases prescribed in Article 211 of the Law on Intellectual Property at the request of the holder of industrial property rights or rights to plant varieties, organizations and individuals that suffer damage caused by acts of infringement, organizations or individuals that detect acts of infringement or proactively discovered by competent authorities.

The infringed party must determine the actual damage, the element of fault, the causal relationship between the acts of the infringing party and the damage suffered by the infringed party. Civil remedies can be applied to handle infringements in parallel with administrative measures and criminal measures.

When a dispute over intellectual property arises, the intellectual property right holder has the right to initiate a civil lawsuit to request the people’s court of the province or city to settle. According to the provision on Article 202 of Law on Intellectual Property, the court has the authority to force the infringing party to:

• Compulsory termination of the infringing acts.
• Compulsory public apology and rectification.
• Compulsory performance of civil obligations.
• Compulsory payment of damages for loss.

Compulsory destruction, distribution or use for non-commercial purposes of goods, raw materials and materials, and facilities used principally for the production or trading of goods which infringed intellectual property rights, provided that such destruction, distribution or use will not affect the exploitation of rights by intellectual property right holders.