AI and Automated Decision Making (ADM) in Australian ip
IP Australia’s Strategic Corporate Plan for 2025-2026 lists one of its Significant Initiatives as “Continue to innovate with AI and Automated Decision Making (ADM) tools in accordance with government requirements for their responsible use, enhancing our efficient and effective administration of the IP system.”
Background
IP Australia’s commitment to keeping up with technological advancements is crucial, as AI presents numerous implications for the current intellectual property rights system.
As one example, whereas a human graphic designer may have previously been engaged to create a logo (and that human graphic designer would have thus automatically owned copyright in that logo upon creation, which they may then have assigned to their employer under their employment contract or to the third party that engaged them under their contract for services, meaning someone held intellectual property rights in that logo and could enforce them against a third party at any point on and from creation) now people are using AI to create their logos.
As copyright works can only be created by a human person, a logo created by AI is not a copyright work. Therefore, that logo is not automatically protected by copyright, and the person who purports to own that logo does not hold any inherent intellectual property rights in that logo. There is nothing that can be enforced against third parties. This means that obtaining a trade mark registration for that logo, and thus acquiring enforceable trade mark rights in the logo, in each jurisdiction of interest to the person who purports to own that logo, becomes even more essential than it was in “the old days” when human graphic designers were used.
As trade mark registration becomes even more important, and as people rely on trade mark infringement more and more (and copyright infringement less), the robustness and capacity of IP Australia’s trade mark systems will be tested, and need to be up to the job. That is why IP Australia’s continual monitoring of the technology landscape and market changes, and their implementation of new technological initiatives, is crucial.
In line with this, the Trade Marks Office of IP Australia has a number of AI based functionalities available for use already and in the pipeline.
Of the functionalities available for use already:
1) The TM Checker is a tool available for trade mark applicants to get a general idea of what marks might be cited when they file a trade mark application. The tool still misses relevant marks, and raises a number of marks that are not in reality likely to be cited. In my view, it is best used as a ‘checks and balances’ to make sure you have not missed anything during your searches via the Advanced Search functionality on IP Australia’s trade marks database.
2) The IP First Response platform uses AI to help small to medium enterprises navigate information about their options when faced with infringement issues. This tool provides a lot of great options for people unsure as to what their options might be, but it can be a bit overwhelming and advice is likely needed to help a trade mark owner know which option is best.
ai's future in australian ip
Of the functionalities in the pipeline, IP Australia is working on an AI chat bot, intended to educate Australian business owners about their IP rights, and give them some general information about how they might respond when encountering 3rd party infringement or receiving a letter of demand.
AI Chat Bot
There was a previous attempt to release Prompty, an AI chat bot available here: Generative AI and the IP System. But, if you ask it any questions it just replies with “An error has occurred. Please try again.”
Just like the entrepreneurs that file the trade mark and other applications with IP Australia, IP Australia also experiments, learns, fails, pivots and tries again.
The current AI chat bot in development is still in prototype stage, so it's not possible to go and try use it yourself yet.
But, when it is released to the public, I encourage you to have a play around and see what you think. You won’t have to wait long. IP Australia’s website current states the bot is “coming in April 2026”.
Early look
I was fortunate enough to be asked to review the prototype. Something that struck me about it was how tailored the environment is (the AI chat bot is carefully fed the most meticulously crafted content: only things that have been vetted and approved for IP Australia's website). And yet, still, the user is not always prompted to put in all the relevant facts, so the answers might be quite different than they would have been if those facts had been provided.
Like all AI, the output is only as good as the input. And some of the answers are not complete or take a different flavour than what IP Australia would intend. So, they really need to be reviewed and refined by an IP attorney.
I know IP Australia will iron out the issues, and I look forward to being involved in the testing of future iterations. I am sure when it rolls out it will be a valuable source of information for many people. Rather than Googling their IP questions, they can at least go to IP Australia's AI chat bot as a more reliable source of Australian IP information.
But no matter how many iterations I test, I get the feeling that the AI chat bot will not, and that it simply cannot, replace the value of an experienced IP professional.
Authored by Hayley Tarr, Director of Tarr Law
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