Many people mistakenly believe that copyright registration is necessary for a work to be legally protected. In reality, the Intellectual Property Law stipulates that copyright is established as soon as the work is created and expressed in a specific physical form. So, when is copyright officially protected, and what conditions must be met according to the law?
What is copyright?
According to Clause 2, Article 4 of the 2022 Intellectual Property Law: “Copyright is the right of an organization or individual to a work created or owned by them.” This right includes two basic groups of rights: moral rights and property rights, aiming to comprehensively protect the spiritual value and economic exploitation value of the work.
Moral rights:
- Naming the work; Author’s rights include:
- Publishing the work under one’s real name or pseudonym.
- Publishing the work or allowing others to publish it.
- Protecting the integrity of the work, preventing others from distorting, modifying, or abridging it in a way that affects the author’s honor and reputation.
Property rights:
- Allowing the author or owner to commercially exploit the work through activities such as creating derivative works.
- Performing it publicly; copying it in any form; distributing, selling, or transferring copies of the work.
- Broadcasting or communicating it to the public through technical means.
- Renting the original or copies of cinematographic works, computer programs, and other forms of exploitation.
In short, copyright is the right of a person who has invested intellectual effort to create a work bearing their unique personal imprint, regardless of the form of expression of the work.
When is copyright protected?
This is a common misconception, with many believing that copyright protection only applies to works after registration. However, Vietnamese law is quite different.
According to Clause 1, Article 6 of the 2022 Intellectual Property Law: “Copyright arises from the moment a work is created and expressed in a tangible form, regardless of its content, quality, form, medium, language, whether it has been published or not, or whether it has been registered or not.”
This means that as soon as you finish writing a poem, preparing a lecture, taking a photograph, designing a drawing, or programming software… copyright automatically arises without any administrative procedures, without the need to submit documents, or without seeking confirmation.
However, not every work is protected; it must meet the following two conditions:
Condition 1: The work must be created directly by the author.
The work must be the result of the author’s intellectual labor and not copied from others.
Condition 2: The work must be expressed in a tangible form.
Ideas in one’s mind are not protected. But when those ideas are expressed in written form, soft files, audio recordings, images, drawings, program source code, etc., copyright arises.
This is very important in copyright disputes because whoever can prove they created the work first has a legal advantage.
In short, copyright is protected from the moment the work is created and expressed in a specific tangible form, regardless of whether or not it has been registered. As long as a work is the result of intellectual labor directly created by the author and has been “materialized” into text, images, sounds, drawings, digital data, or any other form of storage, copyright automatically arises and is protected by law.
Is copyright registration mandatory?
Many people mistakenly believe that copyright registration is mandatory for legal protection. However, the Intellectual Property Law clearly stipulates that registration is not a condition for copyright to arise. From the moment a work is created and expressed in a certain physical form, copyright is automatically established.
This is affirmed in Clause 2, Article 49 of the 2022 Intellectual Property Law: “Submitting an application for a Certificate of Copyright Registration or a Certificate of Related Rights Registration is not a mandatory procedure to enjoy copyright or related rights as prescribed by this Law.” This means that even if you have never registered your work, it is still fully protected by law.
However, the law still encourages copyright registration because of the significant legal evidence it provides. Essentially, copyright registration is a way to create solid evidence to prove ownership in case of disputes.
A copyright registration certificate is an important legal basis for determining: who is the author, who is the owner, and when the work was created. When disputes arise regarding copying or copyright infringement, the registered author only needs to present the certificate, while the unregistered author will have to spend more effort proving their rights with manuscripts, original files, email exchanges, witnesses, data creation dates, etc.
The above article answers the question “When is copyright protected?”. Understanding this regulation correctly will help individuals and organizations be more proactive in protecting their creative work and minimizing legal risks in case of disputes.
FAQ
The work must be created directly by the author through their intellectual labor and expressed in a specific physical form, not copied from another person’s work.
No. Copyright only protects the specific form of expression of an idea; ideas, concepts, or content that have not yet been expressed as a work are not covered by copyright.