Brand Protection & Content Protection
-Takedown Guides-
Twitter IP Protection
A Guide To The Twitter Trademark Takedown Webform
Twitter – the breaking news information network for everyone to hear anything going on that matters to them from friends, celebrities, politicians and influencers in no more than 280 characters. A very simple concept which providing a platform for people to share messages to a network. The simplicity of the platform is partly behind Twitter’s success in reaching older generations who generally avoid other social networks. Twitter transforms major world events into open conversations. However, Twitter has social much the same as other large social networks with abuse from fake accounts and bot activity, distorting the conversation and manipulating users. Content governance on Twitter is a significant concern given the laissez-faire approach the company has handled such issues.
Twitter founder and CEO Jack Dorsey said himself that the company has not done well enough to protect users from social network security issues and abuse. Although, his comments came at the surprising expense of digital IP protection policies. Dorsey claimed intellectual property protection was over-prioritised, although most brand owners or third-party vendors with experience with conducting digital brand protection on Twitter are not likely to agree with such claims. For handling copyright complaints, Twitter is responsive and efficient. In handling many other forms of abuse, Twitter is responsive and consistent. However, when it comes to brand enforcement of trade mark rights, Twitter often fails to deliver consistent results, with a lack of transparency behind decision making processes.
The focus of this guide is how-to submit a trademark infringement notice to Twitter through the “Report A Violation” trademark form. There are two options, this guide focuses on the option “I have a trademark and someone is infringing my trademark” – which should be used when a Twitter user is linking to counterfeit or knock-off products.
For the option “I have a trademark and someone is impersonating my brand” please click here.
Unfortunately, the reporter is required to have a Twitter account for the submission and the reporter must be either the trademark holder or an authorised representative of the trademark holder. The Twitter webform does enable the reporter to submit a takedown notice for Twitter, Vine or Periscope, which helpfully provides a layer of consistency across the Twitter brands. To access the webform to report trademark infringement, click here.
Report a trademark issue
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Submitting a notice for intellectual property infringement has serious legal consequences which should be carefully considered before completing the webform. Once ready to continue, the first section of the webform should be completed with the details of the reporter. “Your email” field is required and will be auto-filled with the email address associated with the Twitter account, however Twitter requires a company email address to be used – as this field can be changed in the webform the trademark holder does not necessarily need to give the Twitter account details to a third-party vendor as they can simply change the email within the webform. Although, it is advisable, if possible, for the company to create a separate reporting email using the company domain.
Trademark holder’s information
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All sections of this part of the webform are mandatory except the “Trademark holder’s Twitter username” and “Direct link to trademark record or trademark search page”. The “Registration number” box states that only registered trademarks can be used as the basis for claims using this webform and the reporter should choose the “impersonation report” if they do not have a registered trademark.
Reported Account
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This section enables the reporter to choose which Twitter platform – Twitter, Vine or Periscope – the infringement was detected on. The “Description” box should be completed as comprehensively as possible i.e. if the report is claiming the Tweet links to a counterfeit item the description box should detail the exact features and reasons how the brand owner determined the product is a counterfeit.
Required statements
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There are two checkboxes to tick to complete the submission, to agree that the report may beshared with third parties such as Lumen, but also the infringer and that the reporter has the “Authority to Act”. The final step is for the reporter to click “Submit” and the intellectual property infringement takedown notice is sent for the infringement to be removed, pending review.