How to Address Copyright Infringement
Copyright infringement is where a person exercises one or more exclusive legal rights granted to a copyright owner under the Copyright Act in section 106 without the statutory authority or the permission of the bearer of the rights. Under the act, one is not allowed to reproduce copyrighted work or distribute it without seeking the consent of the right owner. The penalties for these acts include criminal and civil penalties. Often persons who infringe copyrights are ordered to pay statutory or actual damages at a cost ranging from between $750 and $30,000 for every work violated. www.pandapatent.com , an experienced leader in patenting and copyright matters, shed more light on how to address cases of copyright infringement.
In case your copyrighted work is being reproduced and redistributed by another person or company, the first thing to do is to find the right contacts and contact the infringer directly. The internet is a very resourceful place and getting the contact information of the offender should not be a difficult thing to do. When you get their information, approach them directly. Good practice calls for you to make the communication professional and free of threats. Through the communication, request for them to remove any works that have been derived from your material. Ensure that you keep all the records of the conversation and the attempts you have made to deal with the copyright infringement.
If even after contacting the infringer and requesting them to withdraw and stop producing content from your work and there seems to be no response or action by the offender, you can now consider reaching out to the authorities. Begin gathering evidence that will support your case. It is where you bring out the paper trail that shows the effort you put into trying to solve the issue. Also, collect all the necessary information that proves you are the owner of the work that has been stolen or used to derive other content. Once you have sufficient evidence, notify the infringer of your intention to take legal action against them. It might prompt them to remove the copyrighted material and stop the production and distribution of derivative content. In case they do not, now you can proceed to file a notice of copyright infringement.
Procedure to follow in reporting copyright infringement
It is advisable that you register and file your complaint as early as possible for you to secure litigation advantages and valuable remedies that come with the timely registration of copyright infringement.
When filing your notice for copyright infringement case with an agent, federal law requires that the notice include information like:
• A signature, either physical or electronic, of your agent – copyright owner whose rights have been infringed
• Identification of the work you copyrighted and claim that your rights have been violated. If it is more than one copyrighted work that has been reproduced and redistributed, then your agent can list all those works in just one list in the notice
• Identifying the exact material that is claimed to have been infringed whose continued use and access has to be denied.
• The contact information of the owner of the copyright for communication. These include basic including your name, address, email address and telephone number
The primary agency that deals with infringement of copyright is the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The specific units are the Financial Institution Fraud Unit under the Intellectual Property Program and the Cyber Division. The Cyber Division usually deals with crimes of copyright infringement for all electronic and digital work including DVDs, CDs, and the Internet. The Financial Institution Fraud Unit deals with all the other crimes related to intellectual property.
One can file their complaint notice containing all the mentioned information to their local FBI field office or online at the Internet Crime Complaint Center. The complaint will be appropriately routed if submitted to either of these channels.
Supplying of a counter-notice against alleged infringement of copyright content
In case you are the producer and provider of the Disputed Content, and you are actively convicted that the copyright infringement notice was served to you mistakenly, or if you believe that the copyrighted material claimed to have been infringed was misidentified, you can send a counter-notice against the owner of the copyrighted content. The counter-notice has to include:
• Signature of the subscriber; either physical or electronic
• Identification of the disputed material and the location where it first appeared before its access denied or the content removed
• A statement of perjury that you believe that the material being disputed was disabled or deleted due to misidentification or by mistake
• Your contact information including your official name, your address, telephone number and your email address
• A statement shows that you consent to the United States District Court’s jurisdiction for the district pertaining your physical address.
What follows is that your case will be listed to and if the claims of the owner of copyrighted work are correct, the infringer will face legal charges. The court will determine the penalty for the violation of one’s rights.