Artificial intelligence (“AI”) is a hot topic and many organisations will be considering whether to implement AI systems into their operations. AI systems are a useful way to save time and money on tasks which were previously labour intensive. For example, AI systems can be used to draft marketing materials or prepare job advertisements.
An important consideration which is often overlooked, is who will own the intellectual property rights in the works created by the AI system.
Copyright
The AI system may produce original literary work as an output. Copyright protection will automatically arise on the creation of original literary works. However, businesses need to consider who is the author of the works: is it the user or the AI system itself?
The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 states that “In the case of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work which is computer-generated, the author shall be taken to be the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken”.
In addition, the OpenAI terms state that OpenAI assigns the rights in the output to the user. Whilst the answer appears to be straightforward (the user becomes the owner), problems arise when the underlying data sources have been used without the necessary consents. For example, the AI system may have been trained on materials without the owner’s permission and this may raise copyright infringement issues. Getty Images has famously commenced an action against Stability AI claiming that it had “scraped” millions of images from Getty’s website without consent for the purpose of training its AI model and that the resulting output would infringe Getty’s copyright.
Patents
It is possible that an AI system may be used to create new patentable inventions. Many pharmaceutical companies already use AI systems to develop new inventions. It therefore needs to be determined if you can protect a patent which has been created by an AI system.
The Supreme Court has recently considered this question in a case involving a patent which was created by an AI program. Dr Thaler asked an AI program (known as DABUS) to produce a new invention. On submitting a patent application at the Patent Office, the application was rejected on the basis that a person was not named as the inventor. The case went to the Court of Appeal and finally the Supreme Court upheld the Court of Appeal’s earlier decision that a person can have rights in a patent, but a machine cannot. Therefore, an AI system cannot be named as an inventor and a person must be named on the patent application.
Conclusion
Whilst it is acknowledged that AI can be an invaluable tool for any business operation, it is important to consider the risks associated with the use of AI systems before an output is generated. It may be acceptable to create job advertisements using an AI system, but creating detailed website content which includes infringing materials may pose a much greater risk.
Get in touch
If you are considering implementing an AI system into your business operations and would like to discuss the associated risks and appropriate policies to put in place, please feel free to contact Rebecca Anforth (Legal Director) or Stacey Gillard (Trainee Solicitor). You can reach Rebecca on 07984 692100 or you can email her at rebecca.anforth@murrellassociates.co.uk. You can contact Stacey on 07597701046 or you can email her at stacey.gillard@murrellassociates.co.uk.
