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Rise of the Machines: The Future of Intellectual Property Rights in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
Get PDFArtificial intelligence (AI) is not new to generating outputs considered suitable for intellectual property (IP) protection. However, recent technological advancements have made it possible for AI to transform from a mere tool used to assist in developing IP to the mind behind novel artistic works and inventions. One particular AI, DABUS, has done just so. Yet, while technology has advanced, IP law has not. This note sets out to provide a solution to the legal concerns raised by AI in IP law, specifically in the context of AI authorship and inventorship. The DABUS test case offers a model framework for analyzing the different approaches that domestic and foreign courts, as well as IP offices, have adopted to address the issue of AI-generated IP. Despite the variety of solutions that exist and that have been proposed globally, no country has identified an optimal approach to balance encouraging innovation with the need to protect human authors and inventors. This note proposes expanding the Patent Act and Copyright Act to include a new type of IP right, called Digiwork, available exclusively to AI-generated IP. Digiwork patents and copyrights would be property of the AI machine’s owner, or alternatively of the person who commissioned the work, with the AI itself listed as the “source” rather than as an author or inventor of the IP. By granting IP protection to AI-generated outputs, Digiwork rights would promote the use of highly sophisticated AI to generate value for the economy and society. At the same time, they would also safeguard human authorship and inventorship by precluding AI from taking over a legal space they were not meant to occupy
Towards a Strengthening of Non-Interference, Sovereignty, and Human Rights from Foreign Cyber Meddling in Democratic Electoral Processes
Get PDFStates have resorted to meddling in the elections of their counterparts throughout history. Recently, though, there has been an exponential increased in the use of the possibilities provided by technology. Attention to this phenomenon has deservedly grown quickly and exponentially. This has led to debates focusing on the adequacy of international legal rules and general principles to respond to foreign cyber election interference. In many of these debates some have expressed doubts and skepticism about the adequacy of current international law to confront foreign election interference through cyber means. There have also been disagreements about the applicable standards to fight against cyber interferences in electoral matters. One possible suggested measure is the adoption of a new UN treaty specifically addressing foreign cyber election interference. Rather than relying exclusively on the contingent drafting of a new hard law instrument, the present work defends two complementary ideas. Firstly, that existing hard and ‘soft law’ standards can provide guidance on the legal implications of acts that meddle in foreign elections through cyber means, which can sometimes amount to unlawful interventions in the affairs of another State. That said, the necessity of clarification and the filling of gaps call for progressive development of the law concerning the issue of cyber meddling in foreign elections. Furthermore, when political impasses preclude the adoption of new binding instruments cooperative approaches can provide a valuable way to address the cyber threats to democratic elections. Secondly, we argue that alongside discussions about non-interference and sovereignty, it is possible to interpret human rights guarantees, such as the right to participate in political processes, as already demanding protection from elements of cyber intervention in political processes, with those rights being applicable and demanding protection in cyberspace. An interpretation of existing human rights guarantees in light of the general rule of interpretation serves to identify circumstances under which cyber meddling in elections would be amount to extraterritorial violations contrary to them
Indefinite Detention at Guantánamo: How the National Defense Authorization Act results in indefinite detention in violation of international human rights
No full textThe majority of the remaining detainees at Guantánamo Bay have been cleared for transfer to other countries. Provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act that prohibit government funds to be used for transfer and reinforce the United States government’s authority to detain enemy combatants until the end of active hostilities have left these detainees waiting in limbo to be transferred elsewhere. The following piece argues that the resulting indefinite detention that these Guantánamo detainees face is both a violation of international human rights and an unnecessary financial burden on the US government. This Note compares the approach taken by the US Supreme Court and federal district court with the approach taken by the United Kingdom House of Lords in the famous Belmarsh Case, finding that the UK’s approach and the measures put in place after Belmarsh, better preserved human rights. It argues that, in order for the US to comply with its obligations under international human rights law, Congress must create a private right of action under international human rights treaties, the Supreme Court must declare that active hostilities ended with the war in Afghanistan, and the Biden administration must create an executive office dedicated to transferring the approved detainees
Aaron Twerski — Practical Wisdom at Ground Zero
Get PDFThis Article celebrates Professor. Aaron Twerski’s “practical wisdom” in crafting a solution (with Jim Henderson) to a problem faced by Judge Alvin Hellerstein in the so-called 9/11 First Responder cases. The problem was that Congress did not include these plaintiffs within the Victims Compensation Fund (“VCF”) despite there being every reason to suspect that the interaction of workersman’s compensation law and tort law, if left to operate on their own, would generate a politically unacceptable outcome. Despite his clear misgivings – —expressed decades earlier – —about allowing those who control the workplace to enjoy the benefits of limited liability guaranteed by workersman’s compensation while shifting the cost of their own carelessness onto third parties, Professor. Twerski devised a settlement that, in effect, did exactly that. This Aarticle explains how the settlement achieved a certain degree of justice by permitting prudence to prevail over principle
