Enforcing intellectual property rights can be implemented from two angles: increased awareness and enhanced enforcement.

 When intellectual property rights come under attack, it comes not just from counterfeiters or the customers that support the. IP fraud is also linked to organized crime, terrorist groups and people traffickers. In her speech before Intellectual Property Crimes Congress, in Brussels on June 2007, Lisa Lovell, managing director of Brand Enforcement Ltd., mapped out a four-pronged plan to combat this insidious crime.

Provide a Clear Point of Contact

Law enforcement officials are an extremely valuable and cost-effective resource in the anti-counterfeiting war. Many of them are extremely keen but also often extremely frustrated when they come across counterfeit goods that they cannot act upon, merely because they don’t know who to liaise with regarding suspect products.

It can't be stressed enough how important it is to provide law enforcement officials with one clear point of contact This will encourage officials to get in touch with the right person about any suspicious products they might come across bearing a brand name. This may seem like really obvious advice – but well worth giving as many brand owners don't make the effort to take this basic step.

Sometimes police officials can’t make contact with the relevant person at a brand. In fact, sometimes, Customs officials have even had to let container loads of suspect counterfeit products go, merely because they’ve been unable to make contact with the brand owner within the tight time limits outlined by law.

So, simply providing a clear point of contact will increase the extent to which the market is being monitored for counterfeits of your product, as well as the effectiveness with which your brand is being policed on the ground. The beauty of this is, that this extra policing is provided to you at no additional cost - providing you know who to contact.

Therefore, my first piece if advice would this: reach out to as many law enforcement officials around the world that you possibly can, including the Police and Customs who are responsible for protecting both consumers as well as local businesses who are faced with unfair competition from counterfeiters.

Then, once you are on their radar, start developing a rapport. Make sure these officials always have your up-to-date contact details and invite them to contact you regarding any concerns they may have about the policing of your brand. And once a clear point of contact has been established, make sure that all employees within your organisation also know who the relevant point of contact within the company is.

Develop Enforcement Guidance

The next step is to provide officials with enough knowledge, by way of product identification guidance, so that they can make an informed decision about whether a product is counterfeit or not.

So, once you’ve made contact with as many law enforcement officials as you can, be sure to keep them up to date by providing them with some basic guidance, which should typically include the types of products involved, the typical places of sale, and the usual prices that the products are sold for.

This guidance doesn’t have to give away all of your trade secrets of course, but it should at least provide details of most - or all - of your overt product features, as well as perhaps some of your covert ones.

Naturally, this is sensitive information and needs to be provided in a secure manner. The important thing is to give the people who need to know what they are supposed to be looking for enough information so that they can at least take action and hopefully make more seizures.

Once you have provided this guidance, officials will be more encouraged to get in touch with you immediately, if they think that a product is suspicious. This will ensure that no time is wasted and will also increase the chances of uncovering counterfeits that may otherwise have been overlooked.

Share Knowledge and Educate

There is a widespread lack of public awareness with regard to the sale of counterfeit goods. Time and time again we hear that we need to increase awareness, but quite frankly, all there ever seems to be is a lot of talk – but no action.

You can scour the Internet for consumer awareness materials, but you'll realize that there is probably only one industry that has really made an effort to tackle the awareness issue, and that’s the film industry. Many of their advertisements raise awareness of DVD piracy and illegal downloading. Other organizations tackle mistaken beliefs and acceptable standards – reasons why many consumers settle for counterfeit goods.

Apply a Consistent Methodology

Once you have established a clear point of contact, have empowered officers with the knowledge to identify counterfeits of your brand and have set about changing consumer mentality, the next important step is to decide upon a methodology by which your brand strategy should be applied.

This needs to be realistic in terms of both your budget and manpower constraints. A brand with a £1m budget and a 20 strong enforcement team will have a totally different methodology to that of a company employing only one Brand Protection Manager with a budget of £100k.

For example, a brand like Microsoft has a huge problem with counterfeits (wherein both the trademarks and the copyright are replicated). It also has a problem with hard disk loading (where software is illegally downloaded onto PCs) and finally, a problem with pirate (also known as gold) CDs (where only the copyright is replicated).

Now, while the problems of pirate CDs and hard disk loading are still important to Microsoft, they are not as damaging in terms of brand identity or loss of profits. These problems are different from that of pure counterfeits, where often consumers are fooled into thinking that what they have purchased are genuine products. Consequently, it would be more effective for Microsoft to apply the bulk of their anti-counterfeiting budget to tackle the most damaging cause of action - pure counterfeits.

Decisions like these are something that law enforcement officials should be notified of, but rarely are. So, for example, if Microsoft failed to notify officials as to how they have decided to apply their valuable resources, they would find themselves fielding enquiries from officials. Without guidance on how to spot the more sophisticated ‘counterfeits’, law enforcement would more likely respond to matters involving pirate CDs and hard disk loading, which are much easier for them to identify, but which are not the brand's highest priority.

Once officials understand your methodology, you will avoid wasting valuable resources responding to their enquiries and you will see more progress being made in the reduction of counterfeits on the market, and in targeted activity by officials who will know at the outset what resources of their own to apply to a particular case.

So start making contact with as many individuals as possible who are in a position to help you protect your brand, particularly enforcement officials who will, as a result, be more empowered to seize fake goods bearing your brand name. This will increase the level the market is monitored and will in turn result in the reduction in the supply of counterfeits by infringers.

Second, start a campaign to change consumer perceptions by highlighting the knowledge of risks and educating them to make informed choices, which should ultimately lead to a reduction in the demand for counterfeits.

Last but not least, make sure there is ‘less talk’ and ‘more action’. And above all, try to create a united front and speak with a unified voice to force the global culture of counterfeiting into a global culture of resistance against the supply and demand of counterfeit goods.

* From a speech entitled "Enforcing Your IPR: Back to Basics" by Lisa Lovell