At the beginning of June 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of the famous Jack Daniel’s distillery in a trademark infringement lawsuit after a squeaky toy for dogs appeared on the market, which resembles a bottle of the famous whiskey Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 Black Label Tennessee Whiskey in the context of shape of the bottle and other elements (trade dress).

On July 10, 2023, the European Commission adopted a new mechanism for personal data transfer between the EU and the US – the Decision no. C (2023) 4745 (“the Decision”), which stipulates that the US provide adequate and appropriate level of protection, i.e., that corresponds to the one existing in the EU in terms of personal data transferred from the EU to the US companies, without the obligation to undertake any further protective measures. The Decision entered into force and started to apply on the day of its adoption.

In one of our previous texts (available here) we wrote about the connection between the protection of competition and protection of personal data, namely whether competition authorities may consider infringements of personal data in their investigations.

The new General Product Safety Regulation of the EU, which has recently entered into force, was published in the Official Journal of the EU on May 23, 2023, and it shall start to apply on December 13, 2024 (“the Regulation”).

In one of our previous texts we wrote about the recent decision of the Spanish personal data protection authority, by which it fined an employer as the controller of personal data for using the option of audio recording within the employees surveillance system, which data were subsequently used for termination of an employment contract.

The Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Serbia has recently issued the opinion no. 011-00-313/2022-04 (“the Opinion”), which refers to taxation of the fees paid by resident legal entities to non-residents for leasing servers abroad.

At the 120th session held on 7 April 2023, the Council of the Commission for Protection of Competition issued an Instruction on the content and method of submitting a request for imposing data protection measure (“Instructions“), which specifies in more detail the content and method of submitting a request for imposing a measure of protection of data source and/or certain data, in accordance with the Law on the Protection of Competition (“Law“).

As mentioned in one of our previous articles (available here), the application of amendments to the Law on Personal Income Tax, which were published in the Official Gazette of RS no. 138/2022 of 12 December 2022 and which stipulate that the annual personal income tax shall be paid by self-taxation and not on the basis of the decision rendered by the competent tax authority, which was the case so far, commenced on 1 January 2023.

According to the Labour Law (Off. Gazette of the RS no. 24/2005, 61/2005, 54/2009, 32/2013, 75/2014, 13/2017 – decision of the CC, 113/2017 and 95/2018 – authentic interpretation), an employee with health issues, established by the competent medical authority pursuant to the law, shall not be allowed to pursue work that could result in deterioration of their health or consequences dangerous for their environment (Article 81, paragraph 2).

Pursuant to the provisions of the Labor Law (Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia no. 24/2005, 61/2005, 54/2009, 32/2013, 75/2014, 13/2017 – decision of the US, 113/2017 and 95/2018 – authentic interpretation) (“the Law”), by an employment contract the employer and the employee may establish the probation period for performance of one or more related jobs specified in that contract.

Contributed by PR Legal.

On the occasion of International Data Privacy Day (January 28), as in previous years, the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection (“the Commissioner”) issued a publication “Personal Data Protection: Stances, Opinions and Practice of the Commissioner”. 

Fashion house Christian Dior Couture (“Dior“) filed in 2021 to the EU Intellectual Property Office (“EUIPO“) an application for registration of 3D shape of bag of this designer house – so-called Saddle bag as trademark within class 9 (mainly referring to eyeglass and phone cases) and class 18 (various handbags). EUIPO partly refused the application stating that the form of the bag lacked distinctiveness and that this bag is practically one of many in the world market.

Spanish authority for personal data protection recently passed a decision rejecting one of 101 appeals filed by NOYB, privacy activist organisation, against 101 European company for using Google Analytics.

In the Official Gazette no. 138/2022 from December 12, 2022, amendments to the Law on Property Taxes (“Law“) have been introduced.

In the Official Gazette no. 138/2022 from December 12, 2022, amendments to the Law on Personal Income Tax (“Law“) have been introduced.

Amendments to the Law on Electronic Invoicing (Off. Gazette of RS no. 44/2021 and 129/2021), the Law on Fiscalisation (Off. Gazette of RS no. 153/2020, 96/2021 and 138/2022) and the Law on Deadlines for Settlement of Monetary Obligations in Commercial Transactions (Off. Gazette of RS no. 119/2012, 68/2015, 113/2017, 91/2019, 44/2021, 44/2021 – other law, 130/2021 and 129/2021 – other law) have been published in the Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia no. 138/2022 of December 12, 2022.

Spanish authority in charge of personal data protection has recently fined a personal data controller for using the audio recording option of its surveillance system, which data was subsequently used for termination of an employment contract.