Digital Brand Enforcement Under the DPDPA: Balancing Intellectual Property Protection and Data Privacy in India

In India, reliance on data is increasing for digital brands. To detect counterfeits, trademark violations, impersonation, and deceptive business practices, brand owners, law firms, and investigators are now monitoring e-commerce listings, social media profiles, domain names, paid advertisements and online marketplaces to detect counterfeit goods, trademark infringement, impersonation and misleading commercial activity. These enforcement methods often require collecting and utilising personal information such as seller names, phone numbers, account IDs, addresses, screenshots, invoices, transaction records, and communications from the platform. Therefore, the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 affects India’s digital brand enforcement techniques. This article argues that the DPDPA does not prevent brand enforcement. It rather requires that enforcement be more balanced and privacy-compliant. The Act recognises legal data processing exceptions for maintaining legal rights and for investigating violations or legal transgressions. It also imposes duties to purpose limitation, security measures, processor management and accountability. The article discusses the relationship between data protection, trademark enforcement, intermediary liability, and privacy-by-design, and advises using the latter to protect digital brands. It concludes that data privacy and intellectual property protection are both essential to building consumer confidence in the digital market and are not mutually exclusive.