Legislative Problems And Improvement Of Trademark Passing Off Law In Thailand

Passing off is considered one form of infringement,which occurs when a person or company misrepresents their goods or services as those of another brand with the purpose of taking advantage of the goodwill and reputation of the original trademark owner.It is different from trademark infringement in that trademark passing off involves making false representations,while trademark infringement involves the unauthorized use of a trademark that is identical or similar to a registered trademark.In Thailand,there is the Trademark Act that provides protection and exclusive rights to the trademark owners,while the unregistered trademark could not gain protection and enjoy exclusive rights according to this Act,except in the case of passing off,but the provision of passing off still has problems.Thailand is a member of many international treaties concerning intellectual property passing off,such as the Paris Convention,TRIPs Agreement,and RCEP.These international treaties have set out the rules for members to follow.However,some provisions of Thailand’s passing off law are still not complying and do not meet the requirements of these treaties.Therefore,this research will seek to identify the problems of passing off law in Thailand that do not comply with international agreements by researching the related provisions between Thai and other countries laws and comparing them to the international treaties in order to reach out to the problems and suggest solutions for them.As a result,this study has classified passing off issues that are non-compliant with international treaties into three parts:1.Paris Convention in Article 10bis(1),which requires an effective protection against unfair competition,compared to Article 46 of the Thailand Trademark Act,which is the one and only provision concerning passing off,has not provided a protection for passing off,which is one of unfair competition.2.TRIPs Agreement Article 16,which is well-known trademark protection,while Thailand does not have a provision that protects well-known trademarks except in Article 8(10),which just mentions the well-known trademark that any marks similar to it cannot be registered.1.RCEP in Article 11.1.1,which is the main point of this Article,requires the effective and adequate protection of intellectual property.However,Thailand’s trademark passing off law is not effective enough since there is still a problem of a lack of passing off definition,a lack of penalties for passing off,and a problem of limited protection for passing off.In light of the aforementioned problems with passing off in Thailand,the law of passing off should be revised and added to the Trademark Act in order to bring the law more in line with current trade situations and to comply with the International Treaties.