Today’s News Roundup—March 12, 2025

INTA Participates in Seventh Arab IGF Forum

The Association participated in the seventh Arab Internet Governance Forum (Arab IGF) held in Amman, Jordan, and online, February 23–26, 2025.

INTA Senior Director on Internet Policy, Lori Schulman, spoke in the plenary session, Trust: Data Privacy and Data Governance, covering global policy making, understanding issues related to managing multiple jurisdictions data laws, and risk management on both sides of the data access equation.

INTA Senior Consultant in Middle East and North Africa, Charles Shaban, who is also currently serving as chairman on the Arab IGF Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG), spoke in the opening session. He welcomed attendees and discussed how a MAG special task force worked on this year’s program. Mr. Shaban shed light the Forum’s key topics, which included AI, and introduced a parliamentary track featuring delegates from Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Libya.

The Association’s participation in the event is part of its ongoing efforts to demonstrate the importance of intellectual property rights and data issues in the Internet policy space in the region and globally. It’s critical for policymakers who are considering regulation and guidelines for domain names, privacy, data protection, and AI, to consider what will be the impact on innovation, including protecting the fruits of research and investing in protection against fraud and abuse.

~ Charles Shaban, Senior Consultant in Middle East and North Africa, INTA

The “United States Annual Review”—in Print and in Person!

The “United States Annual Review: The Seventy-Seventh Year of Administration of the Lanham Act of 1946” issue (Vol. 115, No. 1, Jan.–Feb. 2025) of The Trademark Reporter (TMR) is now available!

Co-authored by TMR members (and past INTA President’s Award winners) Theodore H. Davis Jr. (Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP, USA) and John L. Welch (Wolf, Greenfield & Sacks, P.C., USA), the “United States Annual Review” is a review of trademark cases for the 77th year of administration of the Lanham Act—primarily opinions reported between July 1, 2023, and June 30, 2024, as well as certain ones falling outside that 12-month period. The “United States Annual Review” is arranged in three parts: ex parte appeals; inter partes proceedings; and litigation in the federal courts and state courts of general jurisdiction.

Join Mr. Davis and Mr. Welch live at the 2025 Annual Meeting in San Diego, California, USA, for their perennially popular session, Annual Review of U.S. Federal and State Case Law and TTAB Developments. Registration is required to attend this session at the 2025 Annual Meeting. Annual Meeting early-bird registration ends Friday, March 14. Learn more and register today.

~ Willard Knox, Editor-in-Chief, The Trademark Reporter, INTA

Open Innovation Challenge Application Window Closes on March 14

Do you know an entrepreneur of a startup or scale-up? Don’t forget to remind them to submit their application to participate in the Open Innovation Challenge (OIC) by Friday, March 14. Finalists who intend to pitch their product/service in-person at the 2025 Annual Meeting in San Diego, California, USA, will receive complimentary registration (maximum of two registrants) to the Meeting. Competitors can also participate virtually. Don’t let them miss their chance to apply to this exciting competition.

~ Lyonel Yu, Senior Strategist, Sponsorships & Exhibition, INTA

Although every effort has been made to verify the accuracy of this article, readers are urged to check independently on matters of specific concern or interest.

© 2025 International Trademark Association