The USPTO Practices What It Preaches: Why the Trademark Office Registered Its Own Trademarks

Businesses of every shape and size benefit from registering their trademarks with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. But what about the USPTO’s own trademarks? It finally got around to registering them a couple of years ago:

So why did the USPTO even bother with registering its trademarks? For the same reasons as everyone else: protecting itself from trademark infringement.

Anyone who has ever filed a trademark application has probably been targeted by scammers who send fake invoices that appear to be from the USPTO. They use names like Official USPTO Bureau, Patent and Trademark Association, Patent & Trademark Agency, Patent and Trademark Bureau, Patent & Trademark Office, and even the Department of Government Efficiency to trick trademark owners into paying fraudulent fees for services that are neither legitimate nor required. You can CLICK HERE to see examples of these fake invoices.

For years, the USPTO has worked with other agencies like the United States Postal Inspection Service to combat this practice. However, the problem is only getting worse. By registering its trademarks, the USPTO added a new weapon to its arsenal: the Lanham Act (the U.S. Trademark Act).

By leveraging the Lanham Act, the USPTO can take direct legal action against entities infringing on its trademarks, such as filing lawsuits, seeking damages, and issuing cease-and-desist letters. This gives the USPTO a new tool to protect trademark owners from scams. Now if only they would mask trademark owners’ addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses in the USPTO database …