Social and Professional Issues

Module 3
Intellectual Property
 Subtopic 1

Intellectual Property
Intended Learning Outcomes
-Understand how to protect Intellectual Property;

-Explain the factors that can be used in deciding whether a use of copyrighted
material is fair; and

-Understand the strength and limitations of using copyright, patent, trade

secret laws to protect intellectual property.
 Intellectual Property
-Intellectual property

is a term used to describe works of the mind—such as art, books, films,

formulas, inventions, music, and processes—that are distinct and owned or created by
a single person or group.

- Copyright law protects authored works, such as art, books, film, and music; patent
law protects inventions; and trade secret law helps safeguard information that is
critical to an organization’s success.
 Copyrights
- A copyright is the exclusive right to distribute, display, perform, or reproduce an
original work in copies or to prepare derivative works based on the work.

- Protection is granted to the creators of original works of authorship in any tangible

medium of expression.

- Copyright infringement is a violation of the rights secured by the owner of a

copyright.

- Infringement occurs when someone copies a substantial and material part of

another’s copyrighted work without permission.
 Copyrights
Copyright Term

- Copyright law guarantees developers the rights to their works for a certain amount of
time. Since 1960, the term of copyright has been extended 11 times from its original
limit of 28 years.

Eligible Works
- The types of work that can be copyrighted include architecture, art, audiovisual
works, choreography, drama, graphics, literature, motion pictures, music, pantomimes,
pictures, of copyright, fair contracts, and free speech.

Software Copyright Protection

- The use of copyrights to protect computer software raises many complicated issues
of interpretation. Registering a copyright for a software program is a simple process.
 The Prioritizing Resources and Organization
for Intellectual Property Act of 2008
- The Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property (PRO-IP) Act of
2008 (Public Law 110-403) created the position of Intellectual Property Enforcement
Coordinator within the Executive Office of the President.

- One of its programs, called Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property (CHIP), is a
network of over 150 experienced and specially trained federal prosecutors who focus
on computer and intellectual property crimes.
 Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines
(Republic Act No. 8293)
- The Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property (PRO-IP) Act of
2008 (Public Law 110-403) does not directly apply to the Philippines.

The Philippines has it’s own similar law which is called Intellectual Property Code of
the Philippines (Republic Act No. 8293). This law outlines the protection of IP rights in
the country, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. It also
establishes the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) as the primary
agency responsible for the administration and enforcement of IP laws.
 Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines
(Republic Act No. 8293)
- The Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property (PRO-IP) Act of
2008 (Public Law 110-403) does not directly apply to the Philippines.

The Philippines has it’s own similar law which is called Intellectual Property Code of
the Philippines (Republic Act No. 8293). This law outlines the protection of IP rights in
the country, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. It also
establishes the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) as the primary
agency responsible for the administration and enforcement of IP laws.
 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade

-The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was a multilateral agreement
governing international trade.

- GATT however, copyright protection varies greatly from country to country, and an
expert should be consulted when considering international usage of any intellectual
property.
 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade

- The Philippines became a member of GATT on December 27, 1979. GATT was a
multilateral agreement regulating international trade, aiming to reduce tariffs and other
trade barriers.

- In 1995, GATT was replaced by the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the
Philippines became a founding member of the WTO. The WTO now oversees the
implementation of the agreements originally covered under GATT, along with other
trade-related agreements. So, while GATT itself is no longer active, its principles
continue to apply through the WTO agreements, which the Philippines is a party to.
The WTO and the WTO TRIPS Agreement (1994)

- The WTO is a global organization that deals with the rules of international trade
based on WTO agreements that are negotiated and signed by representatives of the
world’s trading nations.

- The goal of the WTO is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and
importers conduct their business globally.
The World Intellectual Property Organization
Copyright Treaty (1996)
- The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), headquartered in Geneva,
Switzerland, is an agency of the United Nations established in 1967.

- WIPO is dedicated to “the use of intellectual property as a means to stimulate

innovation and creativity.

- WIPO has strongly advocated for the interests of intellectual property owners. Its
goal is to ensure that intellectual property laws are uniformly administered.
 The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (1998)

-The DMCA (Public Law 105-304) was signed into law in 1998 and implements two
1996 WIPO treaties: the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and
Phonograms Treaty.

- The act is divided into the following five sections:

1. Title I (WIPO Copyright and Performances and Phonograms Treaties Implementation

Act of 1998)
- This section implements the WIPO treaties by making certain technical amendments
to the U.S. law in order to provide appropriate references and links to the treaties.
 The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (1998)

2. Title II (Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act)

- This section enables website operators that allow users to post content on their
website (e.g., music, video, and pictures) to avoid copyright infringement liability if
certain “safe harbor” provisions are followed.

3. Title III (Computer Maintenance Competition Assurance Act)

- This section permits the owner or lessee of a computer to make or authorize the
making of a copy of a computer program in the course of maintaining or repairing that
computer.
 The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (1998)

4. Title IV (Miscellaneous provisions)

-This section adds language to the Copyright Act confirming the Copyright Office’s
authority to continue to perform the policy and international functions that it has
carried out for decades under its existing general authority.

5. Title V (Vessel Hull Design Protection Act)

- This section creates a new form of protection for the original design of vessel hulls.
 Patents
- A patent permits its owner to exclude the public from making, using, or selling a
protected invention, and it allows for legal action against violators.

- A utility patent is “issued for the invention of a new and useful process, machine,
manufacturer, or composition of matter, or a new and useful improvement.

- It generally permits its owner to exclude others from making, using, or selling the
invention for a period of up to twenty years from the date of patent application filing,
subject to the payment of maintenance fees.”
 Patents
- A design patent, which is “issued for a new, original, and ornamental design
embodied in or applied to an article of manufacture,” permits its owner to exclude
others from making, using, or selling the design in question.

- Patent infringement, or the violation of the rights secured by the owner of a patent,
occurs when someone makes unauthorized use of another’s patent
 Patents
Trade secret
- Business Information
- Has required effort or cost to develop,
- Has some degree of uniqueness or novelty, is generally unknown to the public, and is
kept confidential.

Trade Secret Laws

- Protection laws vary greatly from country to country.

Uniform Trade Secrets Act

- Was drafted in the 1970s to bring uniformity to all the United States in the area of
trade secret law.
 Subtopic 2

Current Intellectual Property Issues

Intended Learning Outcomes
- Understand some of the current issues associated with the protection of
intellectual property.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
- Plagiarism is the act of stealing someone’s ideas or words and passing them off as
one’s own.

- The explosion of electronic content and the growth of the web have made it easy to
cut and paste paragraphs into term papers and other documents without proper
citation or quotation marks.

Partial list of plagiarism detection services and software

 Current Intellectual Property Issues
- The following list shows some of the actions that schools can take to combat student
plagiarism:

• Help students understand what constitutes plagiarism and why they need to cite
sources properly.

• Show students how to document web pages and materials from online databases.

• Schedule major writing assignments so that portions are due over the course of the
term, thus reducing the likelihood that students will get into a time crunch and be
tempted to plagiarize to meet the deadline.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues

• Make clear to students that instructors are aware of Internet paper mills.

• Ensure that instructors both educate students about plagiarism detection services
and make them aware that they know how to use these services.

• Incorporate detection software and services into a comprehensive antiplagiarism

program.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
Reverse Engineering
- The process of taking something apart in order to understand it, build a copy of it, or
improve it.

- It was originally applied to computer hardware but is now commonly applied to software
as well.

- One frequent use of reverse engineering for software is to modify an application that
ran on one vendor’s database so that it can run on another’s (e.g., from Access to Oracle).
Database management systems use their own programming language for application
development.

- As a result, organizations that want to change database vendors are faced with rewriting
existing applications using the new vendor’s database programming language.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
- Using reverse engineering, a developer can use the code of the current database
programming language to recover the design of the information system application.

- Next, code-generation tools can be used to take the design and produce code (forward
engineer) in the new database programming language. This reverse-engineering and code
generating process greatly reduces the time and cost needed to migrate the organization’s
applications to the new database management system.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
Open Source Code

- Program whose source code is made available for use or modification, as users or other
developers see fit.

- A considerable amount of open source code is available, and an increasing number of

organizations use open source code.

- For example, much of the Internet runs on open source code; when you access a web
page, send a text, or post a status update, you are likely using an open source program such
as Linux, Apache HTTP, PHP, Perl, Python, or Ruby.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
- A common use of open source software is to move data from one application to another
and to extract, transform, and load business data into large databases.

- Two frequently cited reasons for using open source software are that it provides a better
solution to a specific business problem and that it costs less.

- Open source software is used in applications developed for Apple’s iPhone, Android
smartphones, and other mobile devices.
Commonly used open source software
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
- Reasons that firms or individual developers create open source code, even though they do
not receive money for it, include the following:

• Some people share code to earn respect for solving a common problem in an elegant
way.

• Some people have used open source code that was developed by others and feel the
need to pay back by helping other developers.

• A firm may be required to develop software as part of an agreement to address a client’s

problem.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues

• If the firm is paid for the employees’ time spent to develop the software rather than for
the software itself.

• A firm may develop open source code in the hope of earning software maintenance fees
if the end user’s needs change in the future.

• A firm may develop useful code but may be reluctant to license and market it, and so
might donate the code to the general public.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
Competitive Intelligence

- Legally obtained information that is gathered to help a company gain an advantage over its
rivals.

- Competitive intelligence is not the same as industrial espionage, which is the use of illegal
means to obtain business information not available to the general public.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
A wide array of software applications, databases, and social media tools are available for
companies—and individuals—looking for competitive intelligence data, including the
following:

• Rapportive is software that can be added to your email application or web browser to
provide you with rich contact profiles that show you what people look like, where they
are based, and what they do.

• Crunchbase is a free database of technology of over 110,000 companies, people, and

investors.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues

• CORI (http://cori.missouri.edu/pages/ksearch.htm) is an online database of more than

690,000 contract documents.

• ThomasNet.com is an excellent source for identifying suppliers and sources for products.

• WhoGotFunded.com is a comprehensive website of data about what organizations have

received funding and for what purposes.
 Current Intellectual Property Issues
Trademark Infringement

- A logo, package design, phrase, sound, or word that enables a consumer to differentiate
one company’s products from another’s.

Cybersquatting

- Registered domain names for famous trademarks or company names to which they had
no connection, with the hope that the trademark’s owner would eventually buy the domain
name for a large sum of money.
 References
Blundell, B. (2020). Ethics in Computing, Science, and Engineering: A Student’s Guide to Doing Things Right 1st
ed. 2020 Edition: Springer.

Hauptman, R. (2019). The Scope of Information Ethics: Challenges in Education, Technology,

Communications, Medicine and Other Domains: McFarland.

Kizza, J.M. (2019). Ethical and Secure Computing: A Concise Module (Undergraduate Topics in Computer
Science) 2nd ed.:Springer.

Reynolds, G. (2018). Ethics in Information Technology: Cengage Learning.

Kizza, J.M (2017).Ethical and Social Issues in the Information Age 6th ed: Springer.

Whitmant, M. Mattord, H. (2017). Principles of Information Security 6th Edition: Cengage Learning.

Laviña, C. (2023). Social, Ethical, Legal and Professional Issues in Computing: with complete explanation of
the PHILIPPINE CYBERCRIME LAWS