Transcript trade secrets - razif razali

TTS1133 : INTERNET ETHICS
AND CYBER LAW
CHAPTER FIVE
Intellectual Property
CONTENT
Intellectual Property
◦ Intellectual property and changing technology
 What is intellectual property
 Issues: competitive intelligence
 Cybersquatting
 Problems from new technology
◦ Copyright law
 Copyright – a case example
 The fair use policy
◦ Copying music, movies, software and books
 From cd / floppies to the web

CONTENT (Cont..)
The napster case
 Software piracy
 Ethical argument about copying
◦ Solutions
 Technology, market and law
 Restrictions and bans on technology
 The future of copyright
◦ Free software – issues on an open source
◦ Issues for software developers
 Copyright or patent
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What is Intellectual Property?
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Term used to describe works of the mind,
such as art, books, films, formula, invention,
music and process that are distinct and that
are ‘owned’ or created by single entity.
Copyright law
◦ Protects authored works
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Patent laws
◦ Protect inventions

Trade secret laws
◦ Help safeguard information critical to an
organization’s success
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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COPYRIGHTS
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In the United States, the basis of copyright protection is presented in the
U.S Constitution.
The body of legislation supporting constitutional provisions laws that
elaborate on or expand the constitutional protections.
Copyrights are designed to protect the expression of ideas.
◦ Purpose: to promote distribution of the work, therefore, the work must
be distributed.
Copyright applied to a creative work: story, photograph, and song and
pencil sketch.
The right to copy an expression of an idea is protected by copyright.
Copyright give the owner the exclusive right to make copies off the
expression and sell them to the public.
That is, only the author can sell copies of the author’s book.
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Definition of Intellectual Property
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Only the originator of the expression is entitled to
copyright.
If an expression has no determinable originator, the
copyright cannot be granted.
The copyright does not cover the idea being expressed.
Copyright last for only a limited period of time.
The copyrighted expression must also be in tangible
medium.
A story or art work must be written, printed, recorded,
and stored in disk or fixed on some other way.
Certain works are considered to be in the public domain,
owned by the public, by no one in particular.
◦ Example: the song “Happy birthday to you”, “nasi
goreng’ recipe.
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Originality of Works
The work being copyrighted must be original to the author.
 A work can be copyrighted even if it contains some public
domain materials, as long as there is some originality.
 The author does not even have to identify what is public and
what is original.
 Example:
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◦ A music historian could copyright a collection of folksongs even if
some are in the public domain.
◦ A dictionary can be copyrighted and the author could not claim to
own the word.
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Copyright for Computer Software
Can a computer program be copyrighted?
YES…
 Computer program can be copyrighted (1976
copyright law emended in 1980 to include an
explicit definition of computer software).
 However, copyright protection may not be
especially desirable from a protection
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Copyright for Digital Objects
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The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA) of 1998
clarified some issues of digital objects (such as music files,
graphic, images, data in a database, and also computer
program), but it left other unclear.
Among provision of the DCMA are these:
◦ Digital objects can be subject to copyright.
◦ It is a crime to circumvent or disable antipiracy
functionality built into an object.
◦ It is a crime to manufacture, sell, or distribute devices
that disable antipiracy functionality or that copy digital
object.
PATENTS
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Protect invention, tangible objects or ways to make them not works
of the mind.
Intended to apply to the result of science, technology and
engineering.
A patent can protect a “new and useful process, machine,
manufacture or composition of matter.
A patent is designed to protect the device or process for carrying
out an idea, not the idea itself.
Example:
◦ If two composers happen to compose the same song independently at
different times, copyright law would allow both of them to have
copyright.
◦ If two investor devices the same invention, the patent goes to the
person who invented it first, regardless of who first filed the patent.
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Procedure of registering a Patent
The inventor must convince the U.S Patent and
Trademark Office that the invention deserves the patent.
 A patent attorney will research the patent already issued
for similar invention.
 The patent owner uses the patented invention by
producing products or by licensing others to produce
them.
 Patent objects sometimes marked with a patent number
to warn others that the technology is patented.
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TRADE SECRETS
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Is unlike a patent or copyright in that it must be
keep a secret.
The information has value only as a secret, and an
infringer is one who divulges the secret.
Once divulged, the information usually cannot be
made secret again
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Characteristics of Trade Secrets
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Trade secret is information that gives one company a competitive edge
over others.
Example: The formula of soft drinks, mailing list of customers or
information about a product due to be announced in a few months.
The distinguishing characteristic of a trade secret is that it must always be
kept secret.
The owner must take precautions to protect the secret such as storing
safely, encrypting it in computer file, or making employees sign a statement
that they will not disclose the secret.
If someone obtains a trade secret improperly and profits from it, the
owner can recover profits, damages, lost revenues and legal costs.
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Figure: Comparing Copyrights, Patent and
Trade Secret
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Key Intellectual Property
Issues
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Issues that apply to intellectual property
and information technology
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Plagiarism
Reverse engineering
Open source code
Competitive intelligence
Cybersquatting
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Plagiarism
Theft and passing off of someone’s ideas or
words as one’s own
 Many students
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◦ Do not understand what constitutes plagiarism
◦ Believe that all electronic content is in the
public domain
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Plagiarism detection systems
◦ Check submitted material against databases of
electronic content
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Plagiarism (continued)
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Steps to combat student plagiarism
◦ Help students understand what constitutes
plagiarism
◦ Show students how to document Web pages
◦ Schedule major writing assignments in portions
◦ Tell students that you know about Internet
paper mills
◦ Educate students about plagiarism detection
services
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Partial List of Plagiarism Detection
Services and Software
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Reverse Engineering
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Process of taking something apart in order to
◦ Understand it
◦ Build a copy of it
◦ Improve it
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Applied to computer
◦ Hardware
◦ Software
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Convert a program code to a higher level
design
Convert an application that ran on one
vendor’s database to run on another’s
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Reverse Engineering (continued)
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Compiler
◦ Language translator
◦ Converts computer program statements
expressed in a source language to machine
language
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Software manufacturer
◦ Provides software in machine language form
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Decompiler
◦ Reads machine language
◦ Produces source code
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Reverse Engineering (continued)
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Courts have ruled in favor of using reverse
engineering
◦ To enable interoperability
Software license agreements forbid reverse
engineering
 Semiconductor Chip Protection Act
(SCPA)
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◦ Established a new type of intellectual property
protection for mask works
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Open Source Code
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Program source code made available for use
or modification
◦ As users or other developers see fit
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Basic premise
◦ Software improves
◦ Can be adapted to meet new needs
◦ Bugs rapidly identified and fixed
High reliability
 GNU General Public License (GPL) was a
precursor to the Open Source Initiative
(OSI)
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Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Competitive Intelligence
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Gathering of legally obtainable information
◦ To help a company gain an advantage over rivals
Often integrated into a company’s strategic
plans and decision making
 Not industrial espionage
 Nearly 25 colleges and universities offer
courses or programs
 Without proper management safeguards it
can cross over to industrial espionage
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Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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A Manager’s Checklist for Running an
Ethical Competitive Intelligence
Operation
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Cybersquatting
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Trademark is anything that enables a
consumer to differentiate one company’s
products from another’s
◦ May be
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Logo
Package design
Phrase
Sound
Word
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Cybersquatting (continued)
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Trademark law
◦ Trademark’s owner has the right to prevent
others from using the same mark
 Or confusingly similar mark
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Cybersquatters
◦ Registered domain names for famous
trademarks or company names
◦ Hope the trademark’s owner would buy the
domain name
 For a large sum of money
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Cybersquatting (continued)
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To curb cybersquatting
◦ Register all possible domain names
 .org
 .com
 .info
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Internet Corporation for Assigned Names
and Numbers (ICANN)
◦ Current trademark holders are given time to
assert their rights in the new top-level domains
before registrations are opened to the general
public
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Open Source vs. Proprietary
Software
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"Free software" (economic definition) means
you don't have to pay for it
"Free software" (GNU definition):
– freedom to run the program, for any purpose
– freedom to study how the program works, and adapt
it to your needs (open source)
– freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your
neighbor
– freedom to improve the program, and release your
improvements to the public, so that the whole
community benefits
The GNU Public License:
Copyleft (www.gnu.org)
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Copyleft: a general method for making a program free
software and requiring all modified and extended
versions of the program to be free software as well."
Ethical question: Should you make available to
other software engineers (even those who
work for other companies) reusable software
of your own making?
Ethical question: does the proprietary
software business model allow the patching of
O.S. security exploits as well as the open
source model?
NAPSTER
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What did Napster allow its users to do?
1)
Make MP3 files stored on individual computer
hard drives available for copying by other
Napster users
2)
Search for MP3 music files stored on other users’
computers
3)
Transfer exact copies of the contents of other
users’ MP3 files from one computer to another
via the internet
NAPSTER
NAPSTER CASE
Napster was engaged in the commercial recording,
distribution and sale of copyrighted musical
compositions and sound recordings.
 A&M alleges that Napster, Inc. is a contributing and
explicit copyright infringer.
 By July 2000, the courts prevented Napster "from
engaging in, or facilitating others in copying,
downloading, uploading, transmitting, or distributing
copyrighted musical compositions and sound
recordings, without express permission of the rights
owner.
 Napster had to post a bond for damages at $5
million.
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Summary
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Intellectual property is protected by
◦ Copyrights
◦ Patents
◦ Trade secrets
Plagiarism is stealing and passing off the
ideas and words of another as one’s own
 Reverse engineering
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◦ Process of breaking something down
◦ In order to understand, build copy, or improve
it
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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Summary (continued)
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Open source code
◦ Made available for use or modification as
users or other developers see fit
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Competitive intelligence
◦ Not industrial espionage
◦ Uses legal means and public information
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Cybersquatting
◦ Registration of a domain name by an
unaffiliated party
Ethics in Information
Technology, Second Edition
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