World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)

Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) comprises one of 16 specialized international agencies affiliated with the United Nations (UN). WIPO oversees the enforcement of 21 international treaties concerning the protection of intellectual property. By 2000, it possessed 175 member nations and an international staff of 760. WIPO is funded primarily through earnings from its three major intellectual property registration systems.

International safeguards for intellectual property, such as patents and trademarks, began in 1883 with the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property. The Paris Convention granted protection to inventors for their inventions and ideas in foreign countries, as well as their country of residence. The 14 signatory nations instituted an International Bureau—a forerunner of WIPO—to enforce the Convention's terms. The international protection of artistic intellectual property followed in 1886 with the drafting of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. It gave artists and other creators control over the use of, and payment for, their works in the fine and performing arts. The Berne Convention also instituted a regulatory bureau. The two bureaus merged in 1893 into the United International Bureaux for the Protection of Intellectual Property (BIRPI), located in Berne, Switzerland. BIRPI formed the nucleus for WIPO.

BIRPI transferred to Geneva in 1960 and in 1970 changed its name to WIPO; it became a UN organization four years later. In 1996, WIPO entered a cooperative agreement with the World Trade Organization (WTO). WIPO's duties have grown from administering four international treaties to administering 21. Its work is conducted through its secretariat and by its member states. Among its primary duties, WIPO attempts to harmonize intellectual property legislation among nations, assist with applications for industrial property rights, arbitrate private intellectual property disputes, and help nations share intellectual property information.

WIPO fosters international intellectual property protection through 11 treaties that delineate common intellectual-property protection standards; all States that sign these treaties agree to enforce them within their own territories. Several WIPO treaties—the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), Madrid Agreement, and the Hague Agreement—directly protect international patents, trademarks, and industrial designs, by guaranteeing that a single international filing is enforced by all WIPO signatory States. These treaties allow a creator or inventor to avoid making individual applications in each country for which they would like to obtain intellectual property protection. Between 1979 and 1999, the number of international patent applications increased nearly 30-fold.

WIPO generated several initiatives to tackle the burgeoning importance of information technology with regard to international intellectual-property issues. WIPO addressed the expanding world of global e-commerce in 1999, when it announced its Digital Agenda—an initiative to develop programs and procedures that encourage the online dissemination and use of intellectual property, such as music, films, and trade marks, while safeguarding the rights of creators and owners. The Digital Agenda also targets the need to integrate developing countries into the global online environment, since they are in danger of falling behind industrialized nations with the growing digital divide. Finally, the Digital Agenda seeks to modify existing intellectual property laws so that they address the particular intellectual property concerns associated with the Web.

In January 2000 WIPO launched the Information Management for the Patent Cooperation Treaty (IM-PACT) Project. IMPACT, which constitutes the organization's largest information technology undertaking to date, will fully automate the workings of the PCT by providing electronic filing capabilities for applicants and electronic data transfer between WIPO, patent offices, and the PCT International Searching and Preliminary Examining Authorities.

Another such endeavor is WIPOnet, an online network linking independent intellectual property offices around the globe. Besides permitting the swift exchange of information, the streamlining of application procedures, and the development of common intellectual property standards, WIPOnet seeks to integrate developing countries within the digital environment. To this end, WIPO helps furnish intellectual property offices in such nations with Internet connections and basic information technology equipment. Modernization of intellectual property systems in developing countries is also facilitated through WIPO's Nationally-Focused Action Plans (NFAPs), which are tailored to the needs of each country.

In 1999, WIPO turned its attention to the increasingly common problem of "cybersquatting." Cybersquatters register domain names that approximate the names of well-known companies, brands, or celebrities. Squatters try to generate profit from the high recognition value of such names by drawing traffic to their sites, reselling the name, or holding the name for "ransom" in hopes of accruing a payoff from the entity whose name has been appropriated. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has authorized WIPO to handle cases filed under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy. Many media celebrities have taken their cybersquatting complaints to WIPO for arbitration.