15 Apr 2025

TRADEMARK SCAM ALERT: BE AWARE!

I have recently received multiple reports of a new scam from cloned corporate identities of law firms. Business owners across the UK are receiving letters and emails threatening the loss of their trademark from firms falsely claiming to be IP Attorneys.

The letter advises the business owner may lose the rights to use their brand name if they fail to take immediate action. The letter claims that another company is in the process of registering their trademark and threatens that failure to respond by registering their trademark within 48 hours may result in the loss of their brand rights and ownership to the third party.

The SRA Solicitors Regulation Authority has alerted their members. This is to widen this alert to more sme owner managers who may otherwise be unduly stressed and pay unrecoverable costs to fraudsters.

Prior trademark registrations can be a risk to subsequent unregistered brand users. However existing prior unregistered trademark users have rights of protection which cannot be over-ridden by trademarks registered later by third parties. If you receive this threatening letter or email please do not respond.

As a certified IP advisor and past member of the Fraud Advisory Panel I would be happy to forward such letters anonymously on your behalf to the relevant authorities to take action to stamp out this scam.

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