Relations and differences between anti-unfair competition law and intellectual property law in protecting intellectual property rights

Difference: Intellectual property is a special law, which refers to the general name of legal norms regulating social relations arising from activities such as the ownership, exercise, management and protection of intellectual property. The scope of adjustment is limited to the legal relationship of intellectual property rights, which belongs to the category of civil and commercial law. Anti-unfair competition law belongs to the category of economic law, and the scope of adjustment is the economic relations that occur in economic activities and the unfair competition behavior in market economic activities.

Contact: Generally speaking, legal acts involving intellectual property rights are regulated by intellectual property law, but unfair competition acts that infringe on the legitimate intellectual property rights of others are regulated by anti-unfair competition law, that is to say, anti-unfair competition law is a backup of intellectual property protection or a supplement to loopholes that cannot be regulated by intellectual property law.

There is a famous saying that people vividly compare the three major laws of traditional intellectual property rights (patent law, trademark law and copyright law) to three icebergs floating on the sea, and compare the anti-unfair competition law to the seawater that holds these three mountains below. Illegal acts beyond the control of trademark, patent and copyright law are managed by the anti-unfair competition law.