A report from the World Intellectual Property Organization, a United Nations agency, showed patent filings worldwide increased at a greater rate in 2012 than at any time in the last 18 years. Patent filings grew by 9.2 percent worldwide in 2012, with China at the head of this development as the country with the most filings and as the most popular destination for filing patents. China's State Intellectual Property Office saw an increase of 24 percent in patent filings in 2012.

YouTube recently implemented a system called Content ID that monitors videos where the video's creator runs ads. Content ID, an automated system, searches for material that infringes on the intellectual property rights of others. If it finds such content, it flags the video as an intellectual property violation. While for the most part this system exists to prevent abuses of copyright, for some corners of the Internet it is creating an uproar.

GoldieBlox, a toy company that aims to get young girls interested in engineering, recently used a parody of the Beastie Boys song "Girls" in a video advertisement that went viral online. After the musicians' lawyers contacted those of the toy company about the use of the parody song, GoldieBlox filed a pre-emptive action looking for protection from the courts for its decision, according to The San Francisco Chronicle.

The intellectual property chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement has been the subject of plentiful discussion for the past few weeks. This trade treaty includes intellectual property proposals that were released last month by WikiLeaks. In the normal course of events, the details of such an agreement would be discussed in secrecy until the agreement was signed, according to PC World. However, the whistle-blower website disclosed these details and sparked a lot of discussion in the international relations and intellectual property spheres.

According to a new report from the International Intellectual Property Alliance, jobs involving intellectual property comprise 6 percent of the U.S. GDP. The research said copyright industries added $1 trillion to the U.S. economy in a year. The copyright industries are those involved in the creation, production, distribution and exhibition of copyright materials - from newspapers and books to TV and radio.

Intellectual property is a hot topic in California, as many of the state's most prosperous regions depend on it for their revenue and success. For example, San Diego is the second most inventive city in the world, according to U-T San Diego. For every 10,000 residents, the city files 8.9 new patents, according to the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development.

The IP5, a group of the world's five largest patent offices, released its 2012 IP5 Statistics Report recently. The report is available to the public on the organization's website.

As companies are increasingly interested in completing research in the U.S. National Laboratory on the international space station, intellectual property laws are giving some of them reason to pause and consider the ramifications of this decision.

Steve Bennett, chief executive of Symantec, is warning businesses that intellectual property theft is the greatest threat from hackers. While businesses focus on cyber risks such as malicious attacks and consumer data breaches, hackers are often interested in stealing intellectual property.

On Nov. 20, the House Judiciary Committee voted 33-5 to send the Innovation Act to the floor. During the amendment process, the committee added back two important provisions: covered business method patent review and demand letter reform. The Innovation Act is meant to target patent assertion entities and the time and money they cost corporations and innovators. It includes a provision to shift fees onto the losing party in a patent suit. It would also allow consumers of products under patent dispute to wait until suppliers and manufacturers of the product complete their suit to determine whether they are allowed to continue using the product.