What is Copyright and How it Works?

According to the Law No. 36/2009/QH12 of June 19, 2009, amending and supplementing a Number of Articles of the Law on Intellectual Property, Copyright means rights of organizations and individuals to works they have created or own, including moral rights and economic rights:

Moral rights of authors include the following rights:

• To title their works;
• To attach their real names or pseudonyms to their works; to have their real names or pseudonyms acknowledged when their works are published or used;
• To publish their works or authorize other persons to publish their works;
• To protect the integrity of their works, and to prevent other persons from modifying, mutilating, or distorting their works in whatever form, prejudicial to their honor and reputation.

Economic rights of authors include the following rights:

• To make derivative works;
• To display their works to the public;
• To reproduce their works;
• To distribute or import original works or copies thereof;
• To communicate their works to the public by wire or wireless means, electronic information networks, or any other technical means;
• To lease original cinematographic works and computer programs or copies thereof.

Copyright protects the work in which an idea or information is expressed; it does not protect the idea or information, such as literary, artistic, and scientific works, performances, phonograms, video recordings, broadcasts, and encrypted program-carrying satellite signals.

Generally, copyright protection duration is for the life of the author or creator plus 50 years.