Passing off

A common law tort that prevents one person from misrepresenting his or her goods or services as being the goods or services of the claimant, and also prevents one person from holding out his or her goods or services as having some association or connection with the claimant when it is not true.

A cause of action for passing off is a form of intellectual property enforcement against the unauthorised use of a trademark which is considered to be similar to another party’s registered or unregistered trademark, particularly where an action for trademark infringement based on a registered trademark is unlikely to be successful (due to the differences between the registered trademark and the unregistered trademark).