Creations by AI can be protected by Copyright?

The Intellectual Property Strategy Council of Japan (Chairman; The Prime Minister Shinzo Abe) is now considering how to deal with creations that originate from an artificial intelligence (AI) program using the current intellectual property rights system. In the council, AI researchers and lawyers discussed this issue. It was then announced that the council will prepare a guideline by the end of this March.

Even under the current law, AI creations would be protected by copyright as long as human played a partnership role in the creation. However, creations by an AI that did not involve a human would not be protected by copyright because the creation could not be an expression of thought or emotion. However, creations by AI may become unable to be distinguished from creations by human or creations by AI may become more sophisticated than creations by human in near future due to the technological development of the AI industry.

In this regard, if owners of an AI system assert that its creations were prepared by human, even when they were not, the number of creations protected by copyright will increase exponentially under the current copyright law. Actually, we already have AI based programs that are able to create aesthetically pleasing compositions in only a few seconds.

Thus, the biggest concern is that developers or owners of AI monopolize the copyrights in the market, and individual creators fall from contention.

The copyright system even considering creations by AI should be constructed as soon as possible, and future discussion in the government attracts our attention.

(Reported by Koji WATANABE, Japanese Patent Attorney)