Unauthorised Use of Protected Subject Matter

Intellectual property rights are absolute, which means that an intellectual property right holder has an exclusive right to use a protected subject matter (e.g. an invention, a trademark, an industrial design or a copyright work). As a rule, these rights are time limited and based on a territorial principle.

As a rule, any other person wishing to use such protected subject matter (e.g. to publish or to translate a particular book, to reproduce a particular industrial design, to manufacture a product protected by an invention and the like) has to obtain an authorization (a licence) of an intellectual property right holder for a specific use of a protected subject matter. Agreements regulating these issues are commonly entered into in writing and they set the terms of use (the purpose of use, time and territorial range, remunerations and the like).

Should a person start using a protected subject matter of intellectual property, without prior requesting an authorisation from an intellectual property right holder or without obtaining such authorisation, such use is unauthorised and it shall represent an infringement of a holder’s right.

It is only in certain specific and very restricted cases, set by the law, that the use of a protected subject matter of intellectual property without a right holder’s authorization shall not represent an infringement of the right.