Regulating the internet is like trying to bottle lightning using chopsticks

Rampant online counterfeiting and digital piracy are no longer peripheral, inconvenient enforcement issues; they are issues at the epicentre of raging, global debate about AI governance, platform responsibility and the limits of regulation in digital markets.  The IPO's Anti-Counterfeiting & Anti-Piracy Committee operates at that fault line, bringing together major brands, platforms, law firms and policymakers to influence how those debates translate into action. Stepping into the Chair role reflects both the scale of the challenge and the opportunity to shape how the system responds.

As an influential and globally respected policy organization based in Washington DC, IPO operates in the heartland of legislators and policy makers. Its membership comprises major global brands across all sectors, including pharma, healthcare, consumer electronics and fashion.

The ACAP Committee comprises leading brands, leading attorney firms and major internet platforms, each of which is committed to protecting brands and consumers from harm. It is an honor and privilege to shape the work of the Committee as its Chair and servant leader.

A moving target, not a static problem

One of the defining features of brand protection today is its volatility. The industry rarely has the luxury of solving yesterday's problem for any length of time. Today's biggest challenge will be different to next week's biggest challenge. That's the reality of the space we're in and recent history makes this point. 

It seems not long ago that the industry was confronting the feverish and much-vaunted Metaverse and NFTs. Today, the biggest challenge - and opportunity -  is undoubtedly AI and in particular large language model 'answer engines'.

Legal systems are only beginning to catch up. In the last 12 months, persuasive judicial authority has emerged in the UK (Getty Images v Stability AI) as well as the largest copyright infringement settlement in US legal history (Bartz v Anthropic). This is just a flavor of what is to come as the technology develops and regulators grapple with what effective and appropriate regulation looks like.

At the same time, digital commerce has skyrocketed under comparatively light regulatory pressure, a dynamic that has historically favored speed and scale over rights protection,

 often to the detriment of rights owners. It remains to be seen whether regulators will adopt the same approach as we plunge ever deeper into the brave new world of AI.

Strategy under constraint

Against this backdrop, the question is no longer whether infringement can be eliminated, but how rights owners choose to respond under sustained pressure.

Rights owners need to be highly strategic in how they approach brand and content protection.

Regulating the internet - a contested, Sisyphean proposition at the best of times - is like trying to bottle lightning using chopsticks. Without a coherent and considered AI-powered tech strategy, rights owners  do not stand a chance against decentralized, protean, globally-dispersed actors.

But what they can do is be thoughtful and strategic around how to mount a defence when under sustained attack.

Budget constraints make that strategic clarity unavoidable. With ever-increasing pressure on departmental budgets, the need for strategic solutions has never been greater.

The threats themselves are rarely uniform. They differ by geography, channel, sector and business model.

A rights  issue might be  centered on marketplaces in Vietnam. Perhaps infringers are using a brand's trademarks and proprietary image content on social media platforms to 'open the door' and divert traffic to other locations. Perhaps  a pharmaceutical company is trying to tackle websites operating illegal online pharmacies. Maybe a brand owner wants to mount an investigation in order to identify and stop the source. Perhaps the objective is to sue counterfeiters in Federal Court and recover lost revenue."

What matters isn't reacting everywhere, but acting deliberately and with focus where it counts.

By engaging a strategic brand protection partner, that becomes possible and ensures that a company's  investment in intellectual rights, their brand and their consumers are safeguarded."

Collaboration is no longer optional

Enforcement in isolation is increasingly ineffective. The most durable outcomes emerge when responsibility is shared across the ecosystem. Indeed, the best outcomes for rights owners are undoubtedly secured when brands and platforms work together.

Regulatory pressure has already begun to alter platform behavior, but alignment remains fragile. Legal and regulatory pressure on platforms has intensified in recent years - especially in the United States, and also in Europe with the Digital Services Act now enacted into law  - with the result that platforms are now required to do more to support brands, whether that is through vetting sellers, enforcing repeat infringer policies or proactive monitoring and enforcement. 

Collaboration and strategic alignment is vital to ensuring good outcomes. This is precisely where the IPO's Anti-Counterfeiting & Anti-Piracy Committee exerts influence.

 It enables a broad range of stakeholders to come together and debate policy. Its strength lies in its diversity of membership ensuring that a variety of perspectives are 'at the table'. Collaboration and critical thinking are key.

Evidence over anecdotes

It is data that's the difference between persuasive policy and well-intentioned rhetoric.

Effective policy reform hinges on leveraging objective data to influence and shape debate. Few companies are better placed than Corsearch to leverage that.

Retiring the "victimless crime" myth

Whilst taking the seat at the head of the IPO table another key priority will be to dispel the damaging misconception, that counterfeiting is benign. The real-world consequences are extensive, from consumer harm and labor exploitation to organized crime and lost public revenue.

In fact, counterfeiting is far from victimless and its scale is truly mind bending, with the OECD estimating in a recent report that global trade in counterfeit goods is estimated at $467 Billion US dollars.

Fix the incentives, not just the tools

Another common misconception is that anti-counterfeiting is purely a technology problem. It is not. It is an economic coordination problem. Fix the incentives, and most of the rest gets easier.

It is a reframing that shifts the conversation away from takedowns and toward accountability, and one that will likely define my leadership of the Committee in the year ahead.