Several lawyers sued Amazon for defamation

Since the end of March, many Amazon sellers have had their brand registrations rejected because of "problems with the lawyers who registered the trademark." A "lawyer blacklist" has also been circulating on major communities and social platforms. It is said that the lawyers on the list have been marked by Amazon, and Amazon will not approve any trademarks registered by them.

Until now, this problem still troubles many sellers, and not long ago, some sellers reported that their brand trademarks were suddenly stripped. With the big promotion coming, sellers are anxious to find a solution. In many cases, sellers can only passively accept the platform's policies and measures, and this is also the case in this case, but the lawyers who were "named" are not happy with it. Several lawyers in recent incidents have sued Amazon one after another.

Business volume dropped by 75%, and lawyers angrily sued Amazon

In this incident, those affected include not only cross-border e-commerce sellers, but also lawyers engaged in trademark registration agency business.

Sellers usually need to complete trademark registration before registering their brand on Amazon. However, as overseas applicants, Chinese cross-border e-commerce sellers need to be represented by a licensed U.S. attorney when registering a U.S. trademark. Therefore, many U.S. lawyers make a lot of money from this business.

The US site is Amazon's largest site. According to Statista data, of the 1.5 million active sellers worldwide, 1.11 million are on the US site. According to Marketplace Pulse data, in 2022, Chinese sellers accounted for 48% of Amazon's US site.

It can be seen from this that if Amazon strangles them, these lawyers will lose a lot of real money. So when some lawyers learned that they were included in Amazon's "blacklist", they were angry and sued Amazon one after another.

A month ago, Nazly Aileen Bayramoglu, a trademark attorney in the Las Vegas area, first filed a defamation lawsuit against it. On June 20, Amazon sent her an apology letter and reached a settlement.

However, just a few days after the two parties reached a settlement, on June 24, Francis Koh, another intellectual property lawyer in Washington, DC, filed a similar lawsuit in the Maryland District Court, claiming that he had lost more than 75% of his trademark business due to Amazon's incorrect labeling.

Recently, a lawyer named Shan Zhu also sued Amazon for defamation in the Eastern District Court of New York. It is alleged that Amazon told the lawyer's client that he violated US patent and trademark rules and had previously submitted an invalid trademark to the US Patent and Trademark Office.

In fact, regarding the issue of "Amazon sellers' brand registration being rejected due to lawyer issues", En.com had received a tip from a seller as early as the end of March. The seller said that the email from Amazon stated that he was not eligible for brand registration for a reason similar to what Shan Zhu described in the lawsuit: because the trademark registration was submitted by a lawyer who had previously been associated with a trademark that was approved/declared invalid by the USPTO for violating the terms and conditions of the USPTO.

Brand registration is the foundation for sellers' long-term and stable development. It can help sellers gain exposure opportunities for brands and products that other sellers do not have, and enjoy the full range of brand building and protection tools provided by Amazon. However, some sellers have reported that the problems caused by "problematic lawyers" are not only the rejection of brand registration, but also the possibility that successfully registered brands may "disappear."

The brand trademark was suddenly stripped, is it still related to the “blacklist lawyer”?

Not long ago, a seller said that the brand trademarks of many people around him were suddenly taken away. All authorized store brands were affected. Although the links can be sold normally, it is difficult to appeal the trademarks back, and it is impossible to stop copycat sales.

Based on his and other sellers’ feedback, when brand registration is rejected or brand trademark is taken away, the solutions are as follows:

One is to abandon the trademark and register another brand. But there is a problem here. If the seller does not have a backup trademark, he needs to re-register, which will cost a fee and take time.

The second is to search for the representative registered attorney of the trademark. If it involves an attorney "marked" by Amazon, contact the agency service provider to change it, and you can try to appeal at the same time. However, changing attorneys also involves costs.

The third is to reapply for other categories of the trademark and register it with the store so that you can continue to use the trademark.

The fourth is to register the same trademark in other countries, then cancel the U.S. registration, register it in another country, and then authorize it to the U.S. site.

However, some trademark registration service providers suggest that if a brand trademark involves a "problematic lawyer", it is best to abandon it.

At the same time, it is worth noting that if a brand trademark is revoked, it must be dealt with as soon as possible. A seller shared his experience and said that although the link can be sold normally for the time being, Amazon will settle the score later. Previously, his store had been selling for half a year after the brand was revoked, and one day he was suddenly notified that he needed a brand sales license to sell it again.

Now many sellers clearly feel that Amazon's control over brand registration is getting stricter and stricter. Some sellers said that their brand registration was judged as abuse after the first submission. Amazon sellers know that if it is judged as brand abuse, it may result in the brand being removed or unable to re-register.

In addition, a list of lawyers “labeled” by Amazon has been circulated on major communities and social media (see the picture below). Although the authenticity of this list cannot be verified, two of the three lawyers who sued Amazon are indeed on the list. Sellers who have been paying attention to this issue have found that the tone of Amazon’s notification emails has now changed from lawyer issues to brand abuse.

From this we can boldly guess that Amazon does have a "list of black lawyers" in mind, but in order to avoid the risk and trouble of being sued, it does not directly "name" the lawyers now, but instead throws the problem to brand abuse.

The inability to register a brand is a thorny issue for sellers, so some sellers are now planning to use accelerators to register in the future in order to avoid problems.

Of course, sellers’ frequent brand registration rejections or brand abuse judgments are ultimately due to lawyer issues. Therefore, if you are looking for a service provider to register a trademark, before brand registration, you can first “investigate” the lawyer who registered the trademark on your behalf. The information you look for mainly includes: 1. Whether the lawyer is on the blacklist of the Trademark Office (website: https://foiadocuments.uspto.gov/oed/); 2. Whether the trademark is alive; 3. Look for the lawyer’s qualification information on the lawyer qualification information website.

If all three items are ruled out, it can be proved that the lawyer is fine. If the filing is still rejected, the above-mentioned supporting materials can be explained in the email when submitting the application again.

Amazon Brand Registry