Jan 13, 2025
How to Handle Shopify Trademark Infringement & Secure Your Store
Imagine a shady competitor using your business's good name to sell knock-off products. On top of the lost sales and customer confusion, the situation spells real trouble for your brand's reputation. This scenario is typical for online sellers. And if you're using Shopify to power your store, it probably means you've experienced trademark infringement on some level. This article will explain what Shopify trademark infringement is and offer brand protection strategies to help combat it.
A reliable solution like Bustle's copycat detection tool can help you quickly identify copies of your store’s products and any mentions of your brand online so you can effortlessly resolve trademark infringement issues on Shopify.
Table of Contents
What is a Trademark Infringement on Shopify?
Trademark infringement involves the unauthorized use of a trademark that confuses consumers about who makes a product or provides a service. In the context of Shopify, a seller can infringe on your trademark, for example, by using your logo to sell counterfeit goods or misusing your trademarked name in product listings or their store name. Shopify’s policies regarding trademark infringement aim to protect the integrity of brand identities.
What is a Trademark?
A trademark is a type of source identifier that’s important to a business’s brand recognition. In other words, it’s a characteristic that consumers can point to as something unique to your brand. Source identifiers may include a unique combination of letters, sounds, symbols, or designs. A couple of trademarks your business can get: common law or registered trademarks.
Common Law Trademarks
You’ve probably noticed the symbol ™ beside many brand names and logos. That ™ indicates an unregistered—also known as common law—trademark. No official trademark registration process is necessary to establish a common law trademark. Instead, simply do business using your business name or logo, which will automatically offer you some protection.
Before you use this symbol, do your due diligence to ensure you’re not infringing on an existing trademark. Your protections under a common law trademark are much more limited than those of a registered trademark.
A Path to Stronger Protection
Because protections aren’t as comprehensive under common law, you may want only to use this type of trademark if you’ve recently launched your business or if it operates in a single geographic area where your market competition is slim. Later, as your business expands, you can officially register your trademark.
Registered Trademarks
Much like the ™ symbol beside common law trademarks, you’ll see the ® symbol beside officially registered trademarks. A registered trademark offers full legal trademark infringement protections in the country you register.
For example, if a trademark copycat uses your logo for their commercial purposes, your registered trademark gives you the right to take them to court. To get those protections, you must register your trademark in every country where you operate. Once your trademark is registered in one country, it’s easier to use that proof of trademark to register in other countries where your business operates.
The Benefits of Trademarks for Your Business
You can do a lot to protect your intellectual property rights while running a business proactively. Trademarks are just one part of the overall picture. While they’re not a silver bullet—you should always be vigilant for trademark infringement—trademarks can offer protection for the hard work you put into building a brand that stands out.
For example, a clothing retailer that prints a particular slogan or logo on their hoodies could register the phrase or image as a trademark. With that protection, any other business that copies its mark without permission can be sued for trademark infringement in federal court.
Trademark Protection and Consumer Confidence
Because trademark protection prevents unauthorized users from capitalizing on your mark, that helps you build customer confidence in your brand. For instance, shoppers know they’re getting an authentic hoodie because the brand’s slogan and logo are trademarked—both are only approved for that business to use.
Legal Protection & Monetization
Once your trademark is registered, you can file a legal complaint against another brand in the same territory that infringes on your IP, and you will be much more likely to win. Once registered, you can monetize your trademark if you sell it to other businesses.
What is a Trademark Infringement?
Legally, a trademark infringement is defined as the unauthorized use of a trademark or service mark that leads to confusion, deception, or misunderstanding about the actual company the product or service is coming from. The United States Patent and Trademark Office always uses the “likelihood of confusion” as the standard for analyzing the extent of trademark infringement.
The kinds of analyses that will be made will center around the similarity of the marks, the goods, or the services, the strength of the plaintiff’s trademark, and any confusion that was caused as a result. Trademark infringements can sometimes get out of hand and significantly damage a brand.
Counterfeiting on Your Brand
Cheap, knock-off counterfeits of your products may tempt customers away from your shop, low-quality products could become associated with your brand, and your reputation suffers. In the end, trademark infringements lead to the same thing: a compromised bottom line. The best way to protect your brand is through automated software like Bustem.
Automated Protection with Bustem
Bustem can detect thousands of counterfeit products and unauthorized sellers and automatically remove them, allowing you to avoid the hassle of manually finding and reporting infringements yourself.
Of course, millions of businesses are out there, and people can use someone else’s trademark without realizing it. Nevertheless, many counterfeit sellers on all e-commerce and social media platforms purposefully steal trademarks, and Shopify is no exception.
Examples of Trademark Infringements on Shopify
Counterfeit Products
Counterfeit products are designed to look identical to the original, existing product, with the same trademarked names, logos, and symbols. The intention is to deceive customers into believing the counterfeit is authentic. This is a particular problem for the fashion industry. For example, a scammer on Shopify may be selling a new Rolex watch or a Gucci T-shirt, but they are rip-off replicas of the original.
Using Other Businesses’ Trademarks to Sell Products
Sometimes, businesses or individuals purposefully use other businesses’ trademarks in their titles, images, or descriptions on their listings without authorization from the original business owner. This helps them to sell their products by hijacking another brand’s reputation. The goods listed may be similar to those offered by the original brand, but they are not counterfeits. Nevertheless, they are infringing on another brand’s trademark. This can also be called “brand name misuse” or “logo misuse.”
Using Similar Trademarks
You may see some shoes with a tick that look shorter than the Nike one. Or a bag with Louise Vuitton written on it instead of Louis. This is a shady area in trademark law, but as discussed above, it is considered an infringement if it has been confused on behalf of the consumer.
Examples of Shopify Listings That Do Not Infringe on a Trademark
1. A Business with the Same Name Selling a Different Product
It is not considered a trademark infringement if a business has the same name as another but sells products in a different category. For example, if a jewelry business is called “Sparkle,” it will not be able to report another company called “Sparkle” that sells cleaning products since this would not confuse on behalf of the customer. In other words, an infringement claim won't go far if the same name is registered in different trademark classes.
2. Reselling Branded Items
If someone buys some Chanel boots and then resells them as second-hand Chanel boots, there is no trademark infringement.
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How to Handle a Shopify Trademark Infringement
Trademark infringement can confuse customers and harm the reputation of your business. If you discover a Shopify merchant using your trademark, you can take immediate steps to address the situation. The DMCA process on Shopify can help you resolve the issue and get the infringing content removed quickly.
What is the Shopify DMCA Process?
When a Shopify store or merchant uses your trademark that confuses customers about the origin of products or services, Shopify DMCA could be your “lawyer.” To address conflict related to intellectual property rights, the DMCA Shopify policy covers the following steps:
1. Receiving DMCA Notices
The system accepts Shopify DMCA takedown notices from the owner. Remember, valid notices must comply with the requirements of DMCA to be processed.
2. Content Deletion
After investigation and verification, Shopify will remove or ban the content that is allegedly infringing. The decision will be delivered to the store owner and the “thief.” For some severe cases, “the thief” can be suspended.
3. Notify the Merchant
The store owner will receive a notification about the takedown. If the content was removed in error, the store owner will be offered a chance to file the counter-notice.
How to Submit a Shopify DMCA Form
Now, let’s go step-by-step on submitting a Shopify DMCA form. Here, we will guide you through 2 ways to file Shopify DMCA takedown notices.
1. Through Shopify’s Online DMCA Form
This is the fastest and easiest way to submit an alleged copyright infringement notice:
Browse the Shopify online DMCA form.
You have to log in to take the next step.
Select “Report a Merchant.”
There is a list of reasons to file a report. Scroll down and choose “Copyright Infringement.”
Fill in all the essential information (as mentioned above) and click on “Submit.” You have sent the form successfully. Shopify will address and respond to you within 10 to 14 working days.
2. Through Email
Sometimes the Shopify DMCA form is unapproachable. You can send a notice to Shopify’s designated agent according to the information below:
Shopify Trust & Safety – Shopify Inc.
Address: 151 O’Connor Street, Ground Floor, Ottawa, Ontario, K2P 2L8, Canada
Email: [email protected]
Once you have submitted your report, Shopify will review the information and take appropriate action.
Acknowledgment: You will receive an acknowledgment of your report submission. This confirms that Shopify has received your complaint and will begin reviewing it.
Investigation: Shopify will investigate the claim, which may involve contacting you for further information. They may require more documentation or clarification to move forward with the investigation.
Action: If the store is found to be infringing, Shopify will take actions such as removing the counterfeit listings or shutting down the store.
Follow-up: You may receive follow-up communication from Shopify regarding the outcome of your report. They will inform you if any action has been taken and may provide further guidance on preventing future infringements.
Alternatives to DMCA Takedowns
In many cases, Shopify DMCA takedown may not be the best solution to copyright infringement. Thus, if you are in this situation, consider the following alternatives:
Send a cease-and-desist letter to the infringer: Reach out to the infringing store and request them to stop using your copyrighted material and remove or modify their content. This solution is ideal when you want to resolve the matter directly and promptly without involving Shopify.
Contact Shopify support directly: Shopify has a 24/7 support team to assist users in handling issues, especially disputes between copyright owners and store owners. Shopify may act if they see a clear policy violation, even without a DMCA claim.
Seek legal advice: For some complicated cases or repeated infringements, contacting the infringer directly or utilizing Shopify support is a gentle reminder and leads to no remedy. Thus, do not hesitate to contact an intellectual property attorney for more advice and innovative legal remedies to end the infringement.
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Find and Take Down Copycats with One Click Today
E-commerce platforms like Shopify offer merchants incredible opportunities to grow their businesses online. Nevertheless, with great opportunity comes significant risk. Content theft, or the unauth
Copycats can steal product descriptions, blog posts, ad copy, and even product images to rank better on search engines, mislead customers, and steal sales from the rightful owner. Bustem is a robust copycat detection and removal tool explicitly designed for e-commerce merchants to protect their stores from the threats of content theft and brand infringement.
Our platform automatically scans billions of websites to identify unauthorized use of your store’s content, including:
Images
Videos
Headlines
Text
Once we spot copycats, we streamline the entire takedown process with pre-filled DMCA forms and comprehensive case management. Built by people who know the game inside out, our service offers:
24/7 monitoring
Instant detection
Bulk takedown capabilities to protect your brand assets
With over 2 million DMCA notices filed daily and businesses losing $29 billion annually to content theft, we’ve made protection simple and cost-effective. Whether dealing with competitors using your product images, copying your ad content, or stealing your copy, Bustem helps you identify and eliminate copycats efficiently.
Get started with a free scan and see who’s been stealing your content. Find and take down copycats with one click today with Bustem.