Intellectual property infringement is a special civil tort. Article 106 of China's General Principles of Civil Law stipulates the fault principle of civil liability and the no-fault principle of civil liability according to law. Although the General Principles of Civil Law promulgated by 1986 officially uses the legal title of "intellectual property" for the first time, it also stipulates that copyright, trademark and patent rights are infringed by plagiarism, tampering and counterfeiting, and they have the right to stop the infringement, eliminate the influence and compensate for the losses. However, judging from these provisions, the Copyright Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) promulgated by1September 1990 and revised by1year1October 2000, as well as other promulgated intellectual property laws, the principle of liability for intellectual property infringement is basically the principle of fault liability, that is, the principle of "action of creditor's rights". The author thinks that intellectual property infringement only applies the principle of fault liability, and there are conflicts between legal provisions and trial practice, which are mainly manifested in three aspects: first, both of them are civil tort, and the principle of civil tort liability cannot be universally applied; Second, the contradiction between legal principles and trial practice restricts the legal protection of intellectual property rights; Third, the relationship between property claim and debt claim is separated, which makes the judge in a difficult position in the judgment of a case.

Infringement of intellectual property rights has basically the same legal nature as general civil tort, and of course it should also have basically similar legal consequences. However, because the nature of intellectual property and the basic characteristics of intellectual property infringement are different from general civil rights and infringements, the manifestations of intellectual property infringement are also different from general civil infringements. The intangible nature of the object of intellectual property rights is the essential feature that distinguishes it from property ownership. Its object is a kind of intangible spiritual wealth, which has no material form, no space, and its possession is not real and concrete. Moreover, compared with other property rights (especially ownership), the existence of intellectual property rights has its unique characteristics of exclusivity, regional effectiveness and time limit. Because of these properties and characteristics of intellectual property rights, the infringement of intellectual property rights is basically twofold, that is, it infringes on the property rights of the intellectual property owner and the creditor's rights of the intellectual property owner; There are both violations of independent property rights (personal rights of works) and single creditor's rights (trade secret rights); There are both intentional infringement and unintentional infringement (neighboring rights); The occurrence of an act is infringement, and the result of the act is also infringement. This duality of intellectual property infringement determines the duality of tort liability principle.