Evaluating a Unified Intellectual Property System of Internet Service Providers in the Electronic Commerce Law -- A Comparative Research Between China and the U.S.
As the Electronic Commerce Law went into effective in Jan. 1st, 2019, not only did China establish a unified IP protection system of ISPs, but also set up a blueprint for a comprehensive mechanism of ISPs for the future improvement. The question is whether this new law can effectively prevent the serious IP infringement issues of ISPs and therefore successfully improve the IP protection in China. To answerer this question, the dissertation analyzes the development of the mechanism of ISPs in copyright and trademark regimes before the Electronic Commerce Law, and seeks to demonstrate the impact of the Electronic Commerce Law for ISPs in China through a comparatively research.
Before the Electronic Commerce Law, China followed a passive-reactive approach of ISPs from the U.S. However, as the online piracy and counterfeit issues continued to grow in the last decade, Chinese legislation decided to shift to an active-preventive approach of ISPs in the Electronic Commerce Law. By comparatively examining the copyright and trademark infringement issues of ISPs between China and the U.S., this dissertation analyzes the benefits and drawbacks of these two approaches, and seeks to demonstrate how an active-preventive approach may prevent infringements more effectively than a passive-reactive approach in China.
To conclude a solution for Chinese legislation to improve the unified IP protection system of ISPs, this dissertation examines several active-preventive approaches in different jurisdictions through different cases of ISPs. As a suggestion for the future legal reform, this dissertation explores the possibility of whether Chinese legislation can legally transplant the Blocking Injunction into the unified IP protection system of ISPs, which may improve the mechanism of ISPs and provide a better IP protection in China