Intellectual property protection related to AI

On the morning of November 5, discussing the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Intellectual Property, delegate Tran Hoang Ngan (HCMC) proposed paying more attention to protecting intellectual property of businesses and individuals, especially vulnerable groups.

Delegate Tran Hoang Ngan (HCMC) discussed in a group on the morning of November 5. Photo: VIET CHUNG

Concerned about registration and protection of intellectual property rights

Speaking at the Ho Chi Minh City Delegation on the amendment and supplementation of the Law on Intellectual Property, citing data from the Department of Intellectual Property (Ministry of Science and Technology), Delegate Tran Hoang Ngan said that the number of registered protected trademarks has reached over 700,000, with an increase rate of about 10% - 11% per year. This is a positive sign, however, intellectual property rights violations are still common. In 2024, violations increased to over 3,000 cases in 6 months.

“In the process of developing science and technology and the current digital environment, intellectual property rights infringement is becoming more complicated. Counterfeit goods are more sophisticated,” said Deputy Tran Hoang Ngan, who suggested paying more attention to protecting intellectual property rights of businesses and individuals, contributing to improving the competitiveness of businesses and the country, especially in the trend of encouraging startups and innovation.

“I propose that the Government provide support to establish registration, recognition, publication, protection, exploitation, management, use and development of intellectual property rights. Pay special attention to the registration and protection of intellectual property rights of disadvantaged people, such as business households, farmers, and ethnic minorities. Their awareness or conditions for registering intellectual property are very limited, so the Government needs to have a solution to this problem,” said Deputy Tran Hoang Ngan.

Enabling businesses to develop AI

Delegate Dinh Thi Ngoc Dung ( Hai Phong ) speaks during the discussion. Photo: DO TRUNG

With the regulation adding content on data mining to train artificial intelligence (AI), according to Deputy Dinh Thi Ngoc Dung (Hai Phong), this is a new regulation in the change of thinking, the first time this issue is included in the law. With that regulation, in the future Vietnam can be proactive in AI and catch up with the world trend, serving the digital economic platform. However, according to Deputy Dinh Thi Ngoc Dung, the draft law is still quite strict in terms of technique, for example, the phrase "organizations and individuals are allowed to use legally published documents and data to train AI", but with the condition "no copying, no transmission, no publication, no derivative works, no commercial exploitation", it is very difficult to meet, if Vietnam wants to promote AI development in the country.

Delegate Dinh Thi Ngoc Dung stated that, in reality, training AI models requires large, diverse, and representative data volumes; data can be collected from public sources such as books, newspapers, websites, or user-generated datasets that are often commercially exploited. If the law stipulates “no commercial exploitation”, the entire domestic AI ecosystem will fall into a situation where businesses do not dare to invest, research institutes do not dare to transfer products, and creative workers lose the opportunity to commercialize their results.

Therefore, Deputy Dinh Thi Ngoc Dung suggested that the law should be redesigned to clearly distinguish between the purposes of data use as “non-commercial” and “conditional commercial”. Along with that, it is necessary to add regulations on data transparency, data source tracking, traceability measures and readiness to cooperate when state agencies request the origin of AI training data.

Delegate Nguyen Thi Viet Nga (Hai Phong) speaks at the discussion. Photo: DO TRUNG

According to Deputy Nguyen Thi Viet Nga (Hai Phong), the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Intellectual Property does not have provisions to determine the subject of intellectual property rights in the case of products created by AI... Therefore, the Deputy proposed to add a principle in the direction of only recognizing intellectual property rights for products with decisive creative contributions from humans; at the same time, proposed to assign the Government to specify in detail the criteria for assessing the level of creativity owned by humans.

Sharing the same concern, Deputy Ha Sy Dong (Quang Tri) highly appreciated the fact that the draft law has added provisions to protect intellectual property rights related to AI, digital content and big data. According to the Deputy, many countries such as the UK, Japan, South Korea and the US have issued separate guidelines on copyright for products created by AI or with the participation of AI.

"In Vietnam, many music, painting, and digital design products have used AI support but there is no clear legal mechanism," commented Deputy Ha Sy Dong, suggesting that the draft should specifically supplement this content to avoid legal gaps, both encouraging technological innovation and ensuring the rights of real creators.

In addition, Deputy Ha Sy Dong said that the draft also needs to add provisions on recognizing and protecting traditional knowledge, open data, and creative rights of ethnic minority communities. This is an aspect that has been recommended by international organizations for many years. Many Vietnamese folk knowledge such as traditional medicine, brocade patterns, ceramic products, musical instruments, etc. have not been protected in any form, and are easily commercialized or copied abroad without any benefits for the community.

MR. PHUONG - DO TRUNG - LAM NGUYEN

Source: https://www.sggp.org.vn/bao-ho-quyen-so-huu-tri-tue-lien-quan-den-ai-post821773.html