Enforcement of intellectual property rights

Intellectual property rights (IPR) protect an undertaking's intangible assets, allowing them to profit from their creative and innovative activities. Ireland has in place a strong legal framework and intellectual property (IP) regime that provides an incentive to invest in the provision of goods and services that result from investment in innovation, design and creativity.

The legal framework for intellectual property rights protection enables enforcement action to be taken, against infringers and counterfeiters who may attempt to take the intellectual creations of others without permission. It is important therefore that the enforcement agencies of the State work together in the fight against intellectual property theft, illegal copying of works and so on.

One of the main objectives of acquiring IP protection is to ensure that the upfront investment in creating the IP will lead to economic reward which tends to give rise to greater levels of innovation. Where individuals and organisations find that others are unlawfully using their IPR, this is referred to as infringement of IP rights. This would include for instance unauthorised manufacturing of a patented technology; or the sale of a similar type of good bearing someone else’s trade mark (counterfeit product); or the distribution of music without the copyright owner’s consent (pirated goods).

Enforcement of IPRs is essential in order to preserve the legal validity of your IP rights, prevent infringement in order to avoid wholesale damage to you and your goods/service including loss of the goodwill and reputation and, to seek compensation for actual damage caused.

The Revenue Commissioners is empowered to take action against infringements of intellectual property rights at points of importation into the State. Revenue is also responsible for liaison and intelligence sharing, with other enforcement agencies, and in particular the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation in An Garda Síochána. An Garda Síochána has a dedicated Anti-Racketeering Unit that deals also with the protection of intellectual property rights within the State such as in the case of illicit pirated and counterfeit goods.

Related websites

European Observatory on Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights

World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO)

Office of the Revenue Commissioners

An Garda Síochána

The European Commission has launched a comprehensive cyber-theft prevention toolkit tailored for SMEs. It focuses on empowering SMEs, particularly in high-risk sectors such as energy, biotechnology, transport, defence, and semiconductors, to protect their valuable trade secrets. It includes awareness-raising materials and training courses designed for SMEs to help them better prevent and respond to cyber-attacks. 

Preventing cyber theft of trade secrets in SMEs: A comprehensive toolkit - European Commission

The EUIPO has launched a campaign which will focus on sports and more specifically on the negative effects of counterfeiting and piracy on the viability of sports and the sport sector:

Foul play: The high cost of IP infringement in sports - EUIPO

The European Commission has adopted the Recommendation to combat counterfeiting and enhance the enforcement of intellectual property rights (IPRs).

The Recommendation provides EU stakeholders and member states with a toolbox to strengthen the EU’s capacity to protect the single market from counterfeiting and piracy. It aims to foster collaboration between rightsholders, intermediaries, and competent authorities in the member states, while encouraging best practices and the use of modern tools and technologies. It consists of strategic initiatives to combat counterfeiting and strengthen the enforcement of IPRs, setting out dedicated tools to increase SME resilience and ability to better protect their intangible assets, including against cyber-theft.

Factsheet

Stepping up the fight against counterfeiting

Further information

Commission recommends actions to combat counterfeiting and better protect intellectual property rights

The European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights (the Observatory) has published a study on the economic impact of counterfeiting in the clothing, cosmetics, and toy sectors in the EU. The study assesses the economic impact of counterfeiting in sales and employment in three sectors; clothing including footwear, cosmetics and toys.

The main findings of the study:

• the legitimate clothing industry lost almost €12 billion of revenue as an annual average in 2018-2021, representing 5.2% of clothing sales in the EU
• as a consequence of sales lost due to counterfeiting, the clothing industry employed 160,000 fewer people each year in the same period
• the estimated lost cosmetics sales due to counterfeiting amount to €3 billion, corresponding to 4.8% of total sales
• the lost employment in the EU cosmetics industry is estimated at almost 32,000 people
• the toy sector suffers the highest ratio of sales lost due to counterfeiting: 8.7 %, corresponding to €1 billion
• the toy sector employed 3,600 fewer people due to counterfeiting

The full report is available at Economic impact of counterfeiting in the clothing, cosmetics, and toy sectors in the EU.

As part of the European Commission to strengthen the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights in third countries, a report is published biennially since 2006.

The report identifies countries outside the EU in which the state of IP protection and enforcement gives rise to concern and gives an update on the Commission’s existing list of priority countries. China remains the top priority country, as was the case in previous editions of the report. Other priority countries include Argentina, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye.

The report aims to improve IP rights protection and enforcement worldwide. It’s goal is to inform rights holders, including small and medium-sized enterprises, of the potential risks when conducting business in certain countries. Furthermore, the report includes details on the EU’s various IP activities – including EU-funded programmes.

European Commission Report on Intellectual Property Rights in Third Countries

Agorateka (derived from the Greek words Agora which refers to a market place while Tèka refers to a library) is an initiative of the EUIPO (European Union Intellectual Property Office) to promote legal sourcing of various copyrighted content.

Visitors to the Agorateka website select their own country and are re-directed to portals that provide links to all legally operated sites where music, film and television, e-books, video games, and sports events may be streamed or downloaded. These sites have the approval of the relevant rights owners representative bodies.

Currently when Ireland is selected, 14 portals appear of which most are the catch up services of TV networks or companies providing multi channel packages in Ireland. Unlike the BBC and ITV Networks, Channel 4’s catch up service, All4, currently remains available to Irish viewers.

Justwatch Ireland is an aggregator website which features various platforms offering downloading and subscription services for TV series, movies and so on. It displays a list of the various platforms from which the TV series series and movies can be sourced, for example, Sky Go, Now TV, Netflix, Amazon, with images of popular programmes and movies being its main feature. The top of the page also features filters such as release year, genre, price and age rating to allow the user to narrow their search. When a TV series or movie is selected, the user will then have the choice to download it in SD, HD or 4K format depending on what the listed provider offers.

Similarly, Pro Music Ireland features platforms offering mainly musical content. It allows users to select legal sites, for example, Golden Discs, iTunes, Spotify and so on which offer downloading, subscription or advertising supported services (some of these may also offer other content such as e-books, video games).

SROC (Sports Rights Organisations Coalition) allows a user to select 9 different sports or events and, upon clicking on their own country, a list appears showing the different competitions or leagues and the TV networks on which they are broadcast.

Other portals with different material may be added when agreement has been reached with the relevant rightsowners representative bodies.

Regulations implementing EU enforcement of intellectual property rights legislation into Irish law

European Communities (Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights) Regulations 2006 (SI No 360 of 2006)

These Regulations transpose into Irish law those aspects of Directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights which were not available under Irish law at the time. The Directive harmonises civil remedies and measures available for the enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights across the European Community.