In recent years, mainly due to EU law reforms, more emphasis is increasingly being laid on issues related to legal protection of personal and non-personal databases. Every set of data collected according to a certain system or method, which additionally requires substantial investment to make, verify or present its contents, is a “database” protected under a specific act of law. This kind of legal protection conferred on the database producer is separate from copyright protection and may be used alone as a basis for seeking compensation from infringing parties.
A database producer is vested with an exclusive and transferrable right to upload data and use all of them or a significant part of their quality or quantity. Legal protection under the exclusive right to databases lasts for fifteen years starting from the first year that the database was built.
In addition to the copyright protection granted to the database itself and the computer programs used to make it or use it, the exclusive rights to databases are currently a strategic instrument for intellectual property protection in a business, particularly in cyberspace. At JWP we have extensive experience of this narrow and complex field, which enables us to provide appropriate advice to producers and ensure effective and protection of their exclusive rights in the broadest scope possible.
Our services:
- drawing up legal opinions and analyses regarding the database protection strategy
- drawing up contracts regarding exclusive rights to databases, drawing up and negotiating licensing agreements and license transfer agreements
- issuing warning letters in order to achieve swift and amicable dispute resolutions
- conducting lawsuits related to the protection against violation of producers’ exclusive rights to databases
- consulting on the ways of enforcing the exclusive right to databases
- holding training courses and workshops on database protection
- consulting and assistance in obtaining WIPO Proof
