With ruling no. 10374/13, the Court of Milan issued its decision on the protection of a complex trademark consisting of the image of a lock with a particular decorative door latch, accompanied by the patronymic “Gianfranco Lotti” (the “Trademark”).

With ruling of last 11 July in Case C-657/11, the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) affirmed that the use of a domain-name and meta-tags corresponding to a competitor’s trade name and trademark can constitute advertising pursuant to Article 2(a) of directive 2006/114/CE concerning misleading and comparative advertising, which defines advertising as “a representation in any form made in connection with a trade, business, craft or profession in order to promote the supply of goods or services” (the “Definition of “Advertising””).

A relatively recent decision issued by the Milan IP Court (July 27, 2013, Judge Giani) offers interesting insights on the subject of interim, “pre-emptive” actions for a declaration of non-infringement, brought by potential infringers.

With ruling of last 18 June in Case C-252/12, the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) ruled again on genuine use of the trademark in a form different from that under which the trademark was registered, right after the recent decision on the same subject matter (in relation to the Levi’s label) that we talked about here on this blog.

The European Commission (“EC”) has recently published its report for the year 2012 on EU customs’ enforcement of intellectual property rights (“IPR”) in the European Union (“EU”).

On 4 July the General Court of the European Union (“GC”) ruled in case T-301/12 as regards the grant of the Marketing Authorisation (“MA”) of Orphacol, a cholic acid-based orphan medicinal product which is used to treat two rare but very serious liver disorders (the “Medicinal Product”).

On 29 June, Regulation (EU) no. 608/2013 concerning customs enforcement of intellectual property rights and repealing previous Regulation EC no. 1383/2003 (the “Regulation”) was published on the Official Journal of the European Union.

On 27 June the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) ruled in case C-320/12 with regards to bad faith of the applicant for a trademark registration in a Member State, in case he knows or may know of the existence of a prior foreign mark which is likely to be confused with the mark applied for.

Within a few months, the Italian Data Protection Authority (Garante per la protezione dei dati personali) has issued two important decisions directed to companies engaging in direct marketing activities: a general decision on consent to the processing of personal data for the purpose of marketing, and, more importantly, the new Guidelines in the matter of marketing activities and fight against spam, both published on the Official Journal of July 26, 2013.

By decision no 452/13/CONS of 25 July 2013, the Italian Communication Authority (“AGCOM”) launched a public consultation on its “Draft regulation on copyright on the electronic communication networks“, available here on AGCOM’s website (the “Draft Regulation”).

CMM, together with several other EU law firms, took part in a European Cookie Law Implementation Survey promoted by Bristows. You can click on the above link to view the consolidated 2013 report.

On 2 July 2013, the Italian Data Protection Authority (the “Authority”) issued a press release informing that it required Facebook (“FB”) to provide clarifications in relation to a bug which was recently brought to light by the mass media, as well as by FB’s admissions and by complaints submitted before the Authority.

A recent judgment of the Court of Milan (No. 5820/2013) on the so-called right to oblivion – or right to be forgotten – on the Internet, ordering a publisher to remove an old article from an on-line newspaper archive, provides a good starting point for an overview of the state of the art in national jurisprudence.

With ruling of 7 June 2013 in joined Cases no. 11626/08 and 11627/08, the Court of Palermo (IP Section) issued a decision on trademark infringement through the use of well-known Google “AdWords” service, as well as on the relevant liability of the Internet Service Provider (“ISP”) providing the service.

On 27 June the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) issued its preliminary ruling in joined cases C-457/11 to C-460/11 requested from the German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) in national proceedings between VG Wort – the authorized copyright collecting society representing authors and publishers of literary works in Germany – and the well-known printer and personal computer manufacturers Kyocera, Epson, Xerox, Canon, Fujitsu and Hewlett-Packard (the “Companies”).

On 25 April, the President of the General Court of the European Union (“GC”) issued interim measures for suspension of operation of two decisions by the European Medicines Agency (“EMA”) granting third parties access to clinical trials data filed by pharmaceutical companies InterMune and AbbVie (jointly, the “Pharmaceutical Companies”) for their medicinal products “Esbriet” and “Humira” respectively (jointly, the “Medicinal Products”).

Further to general implementation started on 2 January 2013, a second set of rules of Directive 2011/62/UE (the “Directive”) will come into effect for UE Member States on next 2 July. The Directive amended Directive 2001/83/CE on a Community code relating to medicinal products for human use (the “Medicines Code”) “in order to prevent the entry into the legal supply chain of falsified medicinal products”.

Last 19 June, the European Commission (“EC”) imposed a fine of € 93,8 million on Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck, further than fines totalling € 52,2 million on several producers of generic medicines.

According to the EU General Court (“EUGC”) ruling issued on 14 May 2013 in joined cases T-321/11 and T-322/11, the mere registration of a domain name should not ground an opposition against the subsequent application for an identical Community trademark, in case the domain name is not “used in the course of trade”.

On 18 April the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) issued its preliminary ruling in case C-12/12 regarding the genuine use of a trademark corresponding to the well-known red label put on the rear pocket of Levi’s trousers.