Intellectual property is a wide range of laws that govern the rights of innovators and owners of intangible products. These products can be in the form of designs, trademarks, logos, software or even technological inventions. The Intellectual Property (IP) is categorized into sub-laws such as copyrights, trade secrets, trademarks and patent laws. On the other hand, cyber laws are the rules and regulations that govern the cyberspace (Torremans, 2016). In this scenario, cyberspace represents computer networks, data storage devices, networks, computers, websites, blogs, email confidentiality and electronic devices like mobile phones. Cyber laws are used to monitor and regulate issues related to cybercrimes, data protection, digital and electronic signatures and lastly cybercrimes (Drahos, 2016). This research paper will discuss the problems associated with cybercrimes, jurisdiction, IP and constitutional laws as related to the case of the "widget" product.
Intellectual Property (IP)
Intellectual property is a field that has become very popular in the United States. This concept is in place to safeguard people with intangible products and grant them the rights of ownership and protection (Drahos, 2016). In the case of “widget” product, the owner has the right to own the products and operate the e-business efficiently without any interruptions. Through the IP laws, the owner of the widget has a right to work without fear and intimidation from the government or the terrorists. Through these laws, it is wrong for another party to steal an idea, which has already been established by an innovator and put into practice. The North Korea terrorist organization has no right to take the design and use it for ill and evil motives. Intimidation by the organization is very wrong since the owner has a right to protect his e-business (Drahos, 2016).
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The evolvement of the digital era has made the possession of online business very challenging. Securing an intellectual property in the current world has become challenging. According to Drahos (2016), the intellectual property has grown wider into covering a wide range, right from protecting a product that one has invented into safeguard the slogans and even brand colors of products. The intellectual property has shifted the gear higher form protecting the trade secret up to protecting the brand for one’s financial gain (Drahos, 2016). The IP preserves some of the areas, which include copyrights, trade secrets, patents and trademarks in general.
Copyright Law
This is the most common protection concept. Copyrights are very easy to acquire. For instance, in the case of the software or an online product, once an individual is done with creating the products, the law copyrights the product. Nobody is allowed to produce the similar product or reprocessing the same product with same specifications without the permission of the owner (Clift & Steven, 2011). In the scenario of the widget product, the owner has a right to conduct the e-business without any intimidation from the evil-minded organizations like the North Korean terrorists. The copyright legalizes ownership of the creator of the original product like music, literature work and intellectual products like websites (Torremans, 2016). However, ideas, which are expressed but not recorded are not copyrighted, this is because the copyright must present a tangible expression, which is marked. The 1976 Copyright Act governs copyrights. According to this act, the original owner of the work is permitted to produce and reproduce his work, distribute the original licensed copies, and display the products for the public marketing purposes (Drahos, 2016). One of the original work is created, copyright is granted automatically whether the owner is registered or not. However, there are quite some cons in registering with the Copyright Department. The registration enables the owner to control any importation of products illegally, and it allows the owner to monitor the products through the government agencies easily.
Trademark
The "widget" product has its trademark, which enables the customers to identify the business as a legal brand. The domain name “widget” is a trademark itself since it represents the e-business as a unique brand, which is operating globally through the Internet. Therefore, no other business will be guaranteed the opportunity to use the same trademark to transact online (Torremans, 2016). Thus, in this case, the threatening of the North Korea organization to use the same idea will be dealt with according to the laws of IP. The widget trademark legalizes the operation of business activities across the work; therefore, as much the blog might tarnish the name of this brand, it is clear that “widget” is not child pornography. Trademarks in the US are protected by the US Code 18A 2320, which controls the use of a counterfeit brand to sell goods and services to innocent customers (Clift & Steven, 2011).
The Trademark distinguishes an original product from the counterfeit products. The trademarks offer the general right to possess a particular design in business. The establishment of the logo helps the clients to identify the producer of the product quickly and enables the customer to establish a clear distinction between which product is original and which one is fake. It reduces confusion of similar products and services available in the market (Clift & Steven, 2011). However, the Trademark does not prevent one from producing a related item, but it stops the individual form producing the similar product and then using same marks and logo brands, which resemble identical products, which can confuse customers.
The Trademark layers are responsible for registering Trademarks. The lawyers are also responsible for advising the business entrepreneurs on the rights of trademarks and its usage. The owner of the product can sue an individual that infringes the Trademark rights and makes the customers to be confused from the original products (Ab Rahman et al., 2016). The lawyers are responsible for ensuring these cases are handled professionally and with the required integrity.
Trade Secrets
Trade secrets are very vital and confidential in any organization. The Trade secrets allow the companies to maintain its confidentiality while operating the business. The secrets enable the market to keep some classified information secret so that competitors may not access the rights. In most cases, food industries have many trade secrets, for instance, Coca Cola company (Ab Rahman et al., 2016). Many companies prefer the use of trade secrets as compared to patents. The reason is that patents typically expire after 20 years while the trade secrets are kept indefinitely without expiration. In addition, licenses require full disclosure of the business (Ab Rahman et al., 2016). Trade secrets are very delicate to maintain, there is no legal procedure or law, which protects the owner from the use of trade secrets. Once the secret is out to the public, it can be used by anybody without restriction (Ab Rahman et al., 2016). In the case of widget business, the owner must keep the secrets of this e-business, as much as the contrary blog tries to rally the negativity of the widget. This will help the widget business a lot because if the owner allows the public to discover the trade secrets, the company will collapse.
Cyber Laws
Cyber laws are the regulations that govern the use of a computer, internet and electronic devices used in online communication. The modern world is becoming more and more sophisticated regarding technology implementation. The various individual has come up with different sophisticated technological advancements that are both positive and negative in the business world (Ab Rahman et al., 2016). The use of the Internet is no longer used for research and information sharing; it is also used to conduct criminal activities online. Most of the businesses are held online, people can transact online, and the product shipped to the destination efficiently (Susanna, 2011).
Cybercrime is very common in the modern technological world. This criminal activity is conducted over the internet by the use of a computer. These illegal activities might use information accessed illegally to perform a costly operation to a business organization or an individual (Torremans, 2016). In the case of a widget e-business, the blogger is taking advantage to commit a crime. When a California individual receives a fault widget, he did not follow the law to return the product for the exchange of the correct product; instead, he went ahead to create a blog and publish the widget website is a child pornography site. This is cybercrime. No one has the mandate to release false information about the other websites regardless of the business it conducts (Susanna, 2011). However, many people have freedom of expression; expressed ideas must be real and not false allegations towards a business (Susanna, 2011). The North Korean organization is also committing a cybercrime. The act of threatening to use the widget idea for evil activities is another cybercrime, which should be regulated by the law.
There are various types of cybercrimes mostly encountered. Examples of the cybercrimes include hacking. This is the attempt of accessing the information system of an organization illegally. Example of hacking incident is the North Korean terrorist organization is the presented scenario. The other type of crime is cyber pornography, which comprises of sharing adult content to the minors over the Internet. The other crimes include spamming, corporate espionage, cyber phishing, and software piracy (Susanna, 2011).
Conclusion
The rate at which the world is advancing in technology is very tremendous. The business organizations should be equipped with the right protection tools for the business. The business entrepreneurs should derive techniques to ensure the laws and respective jurisdictions safeguard the intellectual property. The intellectual property has been undergoing challenges from evil organizations, which only wants to collapse the already established brands. Various authorities control the intellectual property ownership. Some of the laws include trademark laws, patent laws, trade secrets, and copyright laws. For the entrepreneurs with e-businesses, they should protect their brands form the possible attacks by cyber-crime bullies. The hackers on the internet are targeting the well-established business; therefore, the companies should incorporate and register with government organizations to be granted protection by the federal laws.
References
Ab Rahman, N. H., Glisson, W. B., Yang, Y., & Choo, K. K. R. (2016). Forensic-by-design Framework for cyber-physical cloud systems. IEEE Cloud Computing , 3(1), 50-59.
Clift, Steven (2011), “[DW] Cross-Border Jurisdiction over Internet Content/Use,” Democracies Online Newswire, the Mail Archive
Drahos, P. (2016). A philosophy of intellectual property . Abingdon: Routledge.
Susanna. (2011). Carnal resonance effect and online pornography . Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.
Torremans, P. (2016). Holyoak and Torremans intellectual property law . Oxford: Oxford University Press.
