United States of America

Hungary

IP Enforcement

Provisional Measures

[Follow-up question from the US] In its answer to question 25, the Government of Hungary states that the presumption of legal protection for intellectual property rights and entitlement to enforcement does not apply where six months have elapsed from the beginning of an infringement or 60 days from the date the right holder became aware of the infringement. Please describe any possibilities for extension of those deadlines that are available for foreign right holders who have less opportunity to learn of infringements occurring in Hungary and who, when they do learn of such infringements, must seek out Hungarian counsel, have relevant documents translated and generally deal with counsel and courts long distance.

The extension of the six month deadline is not possible even in cases when foreign right holders fail to meet the deadline. In this case the presumption of law is rebutted. This, however, does not affect the rights of the foreign right holder, because provisional measures could be granted by the court under the general rules of the Code of Civil Procedure (Article 156). In such procedure the court is entitled to examine whether the ordering of the provisional measure is, inter alia, necessary to protect the petitioner's rights deserving special appreciation.