Intellectual Property Law #2: Digital counterfeiting
For the second episode of Face au Droit de la propriété intellectuelle, Agathe PECASTAING interviews our experts on digital counterfeiting. Mathieu COULAUD, legal delegate at Syntec Numérique, and François-Pierre LANI, lawyer specializing in intellectual property at Derriennic & Associés, discuss the legal arsenal available to publishers to protect their creations.
More than 1.77 billion euros. That’s how much software publishers lose to piracy. The software black market is huge, but there are plenty of legal weapons at our disposal. Legal action follows a number of stages: first, negotiation. The scope of application is sometimes too broad, and the use of pirated software can be a simple mistake. For more serious frauds, the penalties are severe. Counterfeiting is a criminal offence, and may be referred to the criminal courts.
Our guests give us their analysis and look at the challenges facing service providers and users alike.
Program produced by Décideurs TV. June 2013.
Digital counterfeiting can involve unauthorised reproduction or distribution of software, images, designs and other protected works. This “Face au Droit” episode introduces the challenge of enforcing intellectual property rights in online environments.
Legal questions often become clearer when they are linked to concrete business processes: who creates information, who can access it and what happens if it is reused or disclosed? Documentation, proportionate controls and transparent agreements reduce uncertainty. Because regulation evolves, the date of an original article matters. Practical decisions should be based on current authoritative sources rather than an old discussion alone.
Rights holders should document ownership, manage licences and identify proportionate responses to suspected infringements. Platforms and users also need to distinguish lawful reuse from reproduction requiring authorisation under the applicable law.