Over 9 million forgeries objects were confiscated in 2010
In 2010, the State Security Forces and Corps carried out 3,410 actions and arrested 3,512 individuals for crimes against Industrial and Intellectual Property. In addition, more than 9.5 million objects valued at more than 461 million Euros were confiscated. These are the key data in relation to the actions taken by the National Police Corps and the Civil Guards against industrial and intellectual piracy as published by the Minister of the Interior in collaboration with the Ministry of Industry, Tourism, and Trade, the Ministry of Culture, and the Asociación Nacional para la Defensa de la Marca (National Association for Trade Mark Protection, Spanish acronym, Andema), an association attached to the Board of the Chambers of Commerce.
Of the total actions executed, 54% involve products protected by Industrial Property rights and the remaining (46%) to Intellectual Property rights. The study refers exclusively to confiscated merchandise and does not include the financial damage arising from the exploitation of Intellectual Property rights in Internet that is not authorised by the holders of such rights. The total assessment of confiscated goods was 5.3% higher than in 2009 (461 million Euros in 2010 versus 438 million Euros in the previous year). In terms of autonomous communities, Andalusia and Madrid were the top ranking in terms of the total number of confiscations.
By sectors, the leather goods industry was the most negatively affected (28.18% of the total), followed by textiles (14.4%) and toys (13.2%). Although textiles and leather goods have been affected traditionally, the increase of forgeries in the toys sector and the resulting health and safety hazards are worth mentioning.
Fight against these crimes
The report mentions several serious conclusions stemming from the illegal distribution of goods:
- The destruction of jobs and decreased investments in innovation;
- The closure of small shops and the disappearance of the commercial fibre as a result of unfair competition from the illegal street sales of these products;
- Health and safety hazards for consumers;
- Reduced tax revenues;
- The exploitation of people who carry out the sale of this merchandise by organized crime.
Moreover, infringement of intellectual property rights, physically and digitally in Spain, generates substantial losses for the cultural sectors thereby destroying jobs and wealth in this industry which generates nearly 4% of Spanish GDP. Furthermore, the unfair competition arising illegal traffic of contents not only makes it difficult to develop new business models, but also affects key agents in the culture industries by hampering music, audiovisual, literary, and multimedia production and creation, therefore damaging the right to communicate or to freely receive new creations.
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