Introduction
By the end of December, 2020, 24th meeting of the standing Committee of the 13th national people's Congress representatives of China voted for the adoption of the "Amendment to the Criminal law of people's Republic of China (11)" (中华人民共和国 修正案 刑法（十一）), which will go into effect in March, 2021. The Criminal Law includes several articles on crimes related to intellectual property, and the amendments increase the maximum sentence term to 10 years.
Trademarks
Article 213 increases the maximum term of imprisonment for using the same trademark as a registered trademark for the same type of goods or services without the permission of the registered trademark owner from 7 to 10 years, in particularly serious circumstances.
Article 214 increases the maximum term of imprisonment for the intentional sale of counterfeit goods with a registered trademark from 7 to 10 years, if the amount of illegal profit is huge or there are other particularly serious circumstances.
Article 215 increases the maximum term of imprisonment for the manufacture of counterfeit products with a registered trademark from 7 to 10 years, in particularly serious circumstances.
Copyright notice
Article 217 increases the maximum term of imprisonment from 7 to 10 years for copyright infringement for profit, when the amount of illegal profit is huge, or there are other particularly serious circumstances.
Trade Secrets
For criminal theft of trade secrets, the maximum term of imprisonment is increased from 7 to 10 years in accordance with article 219, if the circumstances are serious. Article 219 also modifies the definition of theft as follows:
(1) Obtaining a copyright holder's trade secret by theft, incitement, bribery, fraud, coercion, electronic intrusion or other improper means.
