Trademark Office Data Leak Leaves Applicants Vulnerable to Fraud

An accidental public reveal of some trademark applicants’ addresses by the US Patent and Trademark Office puts these applicants at increased risk of receiving fraudulent notices, according to some attorneys.

The agency sent certain trademark attorneys and impacted customers a notification on Friday alerting them of a “data security incident” that resulted in public accessibility to some applicants’ addresses, which are meant to be protected in private records.

According to the notice, a copy of which was reviewed by Bloomberg Law, the office discovered this issue in February and took down the impacted bulk data until it implemented a permanent ...