Knowing and understanding developments in technology and current trends in consumer behaviour is key to protecting your brand’s intellectual property rights online.
From machine learning to the rise of third-party selling, we’re outlining some of the major phenomena likely to affect your online brand protection strategies this year, and beyond.
Brand Protection Trends: Technology
Innovative technologies bring opportunities, both for brands and for bad actors who want to piggyback on other people’s success by infringing their intellectual property rights.
As you head into the new year, your brand protection strategies should include awareness of the following developments.
1. Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
AI has been huge this year, and is likely to continue growing in popularity. This exciting tech brings with it a lot of potential: for both brand protection and infringement.
How AI poses risks to your brand:
- Impersonation: AI can aid online impersonation of brands through the creation of deep-fakes, manipulation of genuine content, and (potentially) copyright infringements. When assisted by AI, it’s easy for bad actors to create highly realistic copycat websites, social media accounts and product listings. This could lead to a reduction in consumer trust: especially if those sites are being run by scammers.
- Copyright infringement: It’s not just bad actors, either. People may innocently use AI tools to generate what they believe are original works, while in reality they’re similar to (or derivative of) your existing copyrighted text, images and other creative content.
- Trademark infringement: Another risk, AI-generated content can be used to create counterfeit products or services that infringe on your brand’s trademark rights.
2. Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs)
The rapid rise of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) has opened up new opportunities for digital designers and brands alike.
However, this new digital frontier also presents unique challenges for brand protection.
How NFTs pose a risk to your brand:
- Counterfeit NFTs: Bad actors can create and sell counterfeit NFTs, diluting the value of your genuine digital assets.
- Trademark infringement: Unauthorised usage of trademarks in NFT projects can potentially damage your brand’s reputation.
- Copyright infringement: NFTs can be used to distribute copyrighted content without permission, leading to legal issues and, in some cases, negatively impacting consumer trust
3. 3D Printing
Advanced 3D printing technology allows counterfeiters to produce high-quality replicas of copyrighted products. These are often sold on e-commerce marketplaces that facilitate third-party selling: for example Facebook, Amazon and Etsy.
A recent EUIPO report found that nearly 20% of companies have already fallen victim to 3D-printed counterfeits. This technology is expected to increase counterfeiting risks in manufacturing by up to 50% in the near future.
The versatility of 3D printing technology poses a complex challenge for intellectual property rights. As this technology expands into various sectors from pharmaceuticals to luxury goods, the risk of counterfeiting increases. Brands must adapt to this evolving landscape and implement robust strategies to protect their intellectual property.
How online brand protection software works with technological trends
While AI can be a risk to businesses, it’s also a game-changer for monitoring and protection efforts: especially for automated content scanning.
AI empowers online brand protection software like SnapDragon to quickly scan vast amounts of content to identify instances of copyright infringement, trademark misuse, patent and design copies, and unauthorised use of brand assets like logos, taglines, and other imagery.
- Quick detection of counterfeit products: SnapDragon uses cutting-edge technology to detect fake products being sold on e-commerce platforms, websites and social media.
- Early Warning System: Alerts businesses to potential threats, such as domain squatting.
- Rapid response: Comprehensive monitoring allows swift action to mitigate threats, including issuing takedown notices. A faster response means fewer counterfeit sales and safer customers.
- Enhanced monitoring: By scanning NFT marketplaces and social media platforms, brand protection software like SnapDragon can identify counterfeit NFTs and instances of intellectual property infringement.
- Counterfeit product detection: Advanced image recognition technology can help to identify counterfeit products based on visual characteristics.
Brand protection trends: Consumer Behaviour
The rapid growth of e-commerce has created numerous opportunities for brands to reach global audiences. However, it has also led to a surge in IP infringement and counterfeiting.
There are some trends in consumer behaviour that have exacerbated this risk.
1. Rise of online marketplaces, third-party sellers and copycat sites
- Online marketplaces: Retailers like Temu, Amazon, eBay, and Alibaba have made it easier for brands to list products. However, this also creates opportunities for counterfeiters to sell fake goods under a brand’s name. While these platforms have measures in place to help brands combat counterfeiting, the sheer volume of products listed makes it challenging to manually monitor and identify unauthorised items. To learn more about taking down counterfeits on key e-commerce marketplaces, refer to our comprehensive guide taking down counterfeits across key e-commerce marketplaces.
- Copycat websites: as well as mimicking brands on e-commerce marketplaces, counterfeiters are exploiting online technology to create full-blown websites. This often involves domain infringements – registering URLs similar to the brand’s official one. By mimicking brand assets, they can scam potential and returning customers – either by selling low quality counterfeits, or phishing for information like usernames, passwords and credit card details.
2. Social commerce and counterfeiters
Social media has become a key platform for sellers, but it can be super easy for counterfeiters to sell fake products. Additionally, the unauthorised use of brand assets — like your logo, tagline, colours, and other official graphics — can make it easy to mimic your brand on socials.
Because there are few barriers on social media sites, counterfeit brands may pay for social media ads — spreading fake versions further than genuine products.
As well as damaging consumer trust, it can also lead to trademark infringement and dilution. Influencers may unwittingly promote counterfeit products, indirectly damaging a brand’s reputation.
Goods that are particularly at risk from counterfeiting:
- Luxury goods: a major target for bad actors due to the high profit margin. When fake products are sold online, there’s a huge risk to brand reputation and your bottom line. Find out how SnapDragon helped Olivia von Halle prevent £20m of counterfeit product sales.
- Beauty: cosmetic products are always in high demand, which makes them an attractive target. Like luxury goods, fake products in this space can damage a brand’s reputation and lead to financial losses. However, there’s the added consumer safety risk, as fake beauty products may contain dangerous ingredients. For a more in-depth look, we’ve written about the prevalence of counterfeiting and fakes in beauty. You can also see some real-world results in our Crazy Color case study, showing how we helped a popular hair dye brand approach counterfeiters on e-commerce sites.
- Toys: This high-demand niche is much easier for counterfitters to infiltrate, thanks to 3D printing. Counterfeit toys pose a danger to brand reputation, revenue and the safety of children. To see how we’ve helped toy brands tackle counterfeiters, visit our Play&Go case study.
- Pharmaceuticals: these products hit the sweet spot for counterfeiters, as they’re in high demand and have high profit margins. However, selling fake versions poses a huge risk to public health as well as brand reputation. A good example is counterfeit Ozempic (semaglutide), a highly sought-after diabetes drug that has earned a reputation for aiding weight loss. In June 2024 the World Health Organisation (WHO) released a global alert warning people of the proliferation of potentially deadly fakes. Reuters also reports that the fake semaglutide market is being exploited by criminal gangs, to the tune of billions of dollars.
3. Cross-border E-commerce marketplaces
Emerging marketplaces like Alibaba, Temu and Shein are mainly based in China. Their growing popularity in North America and the UK make things much more complicated.
- Complex regulatory landscape: Different countries have varying IP laws and enforcement mechanisms, making it difficult for brands to protect their IP rights globally.
- Increased risk of counterfeiting: Cross-border e-commerce can facilitate the sale of counterfeit goods, especially in regions with weaker IP protection.
- Unauthorised sales: Another risk is grey market sales, where genuine products are sold through unauthorised channels, and parallel imports: where products are imported into a country without the consent of the brand owner. These may bypass local regulations and price controls, leading to sticky legal situations.
For a deeper dive into this phenomenon, learn how to protect your brand from grey markets and parallel imports.
How online brand protection software works alongside consumer trends
With brand managers and business owners more stretched than ever, brand protection software can help brands be in many places at once. Powered by advanced technology, it can uncover brand threats and start takedown action to help protect your reputation and bottom line.
For these consumer trends, look for brand protection software with the following features:
- Marketplace monitoring: This feature scours online marketplaces to find counterfeit products and unauthorised sellers. SnapDragon, can also support with takedown requests on third-party seller marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay.
- Social media monitoring: SnapDragon brand protection software scrapes social sites for unauthorised use of brand assets, sale of fakes, and copycat accounts.
- Website & domain name monitoring: this service notifies you if anyone sets up a website or domain name similar to yours. This can help to identify and take down domain names that misuse a brand’s name or trademarks, as well as fraudulent sites that may harm your brand’s reputation by phishing for customer information.
Protect your brand in 2025, and beyond
With technology and consumer behaviour constantly in flux, it pays to keep on top of brand protection. SnapDragon is an agile company, quickly adapting to any new trend identified. Our advanced technology is powerful enough to respond to these changes, no matter how adept counterfeiters become at using new tech and exploiting customer trends.
Our tools constantly scan online platforms for fake products, unauthorised usage of brand assets, and other suspicious activity. We can also issue takedown notices for rapid enforcement. Our service is always-on, and looks on digital platforms and domains that are otherwise overlooked. This is far more efficient and time-effective than attempting to do it manually.
Book a consultation to find out more about our protection solutions, and to find out how we can help protect your brand in an ever-changing online landscape.
