Decluttering the US Trademark Register from Fraudulent Filings

The United States Trademark Office has terminated over 52,000 trademark pending registrations and registrations based on widespread fraud by a foreign-filing entity.  Notably, the sanctions order states the following administrative sanctions:

(1) Permanently preclude Respondents from submitting trademark-related documents on behalf of Respondents or others; (2) Strike or otherwise give no weight to all trademark-related documents submitted by Respondents; (3) Deactivate any USPTO accounts in which contact information related to Respondents appears, and take action to prevent Respondents from creating or activating further accounts; (4) Block future financial transactions from credit cards used to pay filing fees associated with the improper submissions and/or associated with Respondents; (5) Terminate all pending proceedings identified by Serial Numbers in Exhibit A because they contain submissions filed by Respondents. . .; (6) For trademark proceedings later found to involve Respondents or containing submissions filed by Respondents, continue to strike documents, remove information, deactivate accounts, block financial transactions, and terminate proceedings.

The Press Release states:

On August 6, 2025, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued sanctions against a foreign filing firm and terminated over 52,000 applications and registrations connected to the firm. The firm submitted documents on behalf of others without the proper authority or qualifications. To conceal this, they: Sought out the cooperation of U.S.-licensed attorneys and then misused their credentials and faked their electronic signatures; Repeatedly signed documents using other people’s names; Submitted fake specimens of use; and Misused USPTO.gov accounts. By removing these records from the trademark register, the USPTO is helping ensure the register accurately reflects trademarks that are actually being used in commerce.

Solutions in Search of a Problem: The Trademark Register Clogged?

Commentators have debated the question of whether there are too many trademarks.  Are we going to end up in a situation where there just are not enough good trademarks left, particularly wordmarks?  Some would argue that there is an inexhaustible supply of potential trademarks, particularly when considered with words and designs in combination.  A recent Wall Street Journal article asserts that U.S. intellectual property officials are concerned about a large number of applications filed in the United States by Chinese companies and citizens.  Apparently, part of the concern is with fraudulent applications. 

One of the curbs on excessive use of trademarks in the United States is the use requirement.  For most filings in the United States, there must be a use--or eventually a use with an intent to use based application.  Interestingly, CompuMark has released a survey which states that China will become the leader in trademark filings domestically and in the world by 2020.  According to CompuMark, China has filed "nearly 120,000 foreign trademark applications in 2017."  And, the number of trademark applications in the U.S. by Chinese companies or individuals has increased by 800% since 2014.  The Chinese trademark registry now has "over 5 million new trademark applications in 2017" and sixty percent of the trademark registrations in the world are in China.  In the U.S., trademark registrations stay in effect for a basic ten year term after the first five years.  

Let's assume there is a problem.  The problem is there aren't enough good trademarks for legitimate businesses and there's a potential for hold-up of legitimate businesses by "weak" marks.  I suppose another related problem is the increase in search costs due to avoiding a massive number of marks.  Some of our solutions could include increasing filing fees and maintenance fees.  Another solution is shortening the time periods for requiring fees.  The U.S. has very long terms.  We could shorten them to two to three years.  We could increase penalties for the filing of fraudulent marks, including increased penalties for the US attorney who files the marks.  We could lower the costs for challenging existing marks.  We could also create a way to dismiss spurious suits for trademark infringement early and penalize over-enforcement through cease and desist letters.  Many of these solutions have been proposed.  Is there a problem?