Question By: Intellectual property (IP) covers any original ideas, designs, discoveries, inventions, and creative work produced by an individual or group. It wasn't a big deal to protect IP in the past. However, with information more accessible and easier to distribute today due to technology, safeguarding your creations and works from infringers, copycats, and thieves has become vital to any business. IP protection is not just necessary to ensure that your innovations won't be copied or stolen. It establishes an incentive so that whatever you create can proliferate and benefit more people without violating your rights. Here are five different ways to protect your intellectual property.
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Register copyrights, trademarks, and patents
Copyright, trademark, and patent are three of the most common types of IP protection. These grant you exclusive rights to your creations, especially when it comes to the commercial gains of their use.
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Register business, product, or domain names
If you're planning to start a business with your IP, you can further protect your interest and identity by registering the business, product, or domain name associated with it. It will also help to secure these names even if you're just in the planning stages of forming your business before others could come up with a similar idea and cause some confusion. For instance, tech giant Apple didn't own the domain name "apple.co.uk." until 2012 since it belonged to an illustration company. It was alleged that Apple paid a substantial amount to the former owners to acquire the domain name. Your business, product, and domain names are part of your brand. Even in cases of a sole proprietorship, where you conduct your business under your own name (e.g., John Doe Photography Service), it will still help to secure registration. You also gain legal protection that makes your business and IP a separate entity from your own person. This will prove valuable should you run into legal hitches in court.
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Create confidentiality, non-disclosure, or licensing contracts for employees and partners
Sometimes, there is crucial information about your business that you should protect from leaking in public. For instance, you are developing a video game, but you don’t want the details to come out before it’s ready to launch. Thus, it will be prudent to ask the game developers and other people working for you, who have knowledge or access to information or trade secrets, to sign a confidentiality agreement to ensure IP protection. Confidentiality agreements must be prepared by lawyers, bound employees, and workers to comply with your demand to keep what they know private. Otherwise, they will be legally liable for any leaks.
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