Enforceability at the National Level in the United Arab Emirates - Essay Example

International intellectual property protection laws have attempted to strike a fair balance between the sharing of information and knowledge and the rights of authors of intellectual property to benefit from their labor and creativity. In order to accomplish this fair balance, especially with the Internet as a tool that can facilitate both objectives, the international framework attempts to foster harmony among national laws for the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights. This research study examines the international framework for intellectual property rights protection and how those laws are reflected in the national framework by reference to the UAE. Intellectual property is described as assets created via invention, innovation, or hard work with the right of the author to forbid the use of these assets as prescribed by law.

Thus intellectual property rights are formalized methods through which proprietary interests in “intellectual assets” are established (Maskus, 1998, p. 187). . In addition, companies that develop software for use via the Internet are at substantial risk of having this software copied by their competitors (Thurow, 1997). National legislation and judiciaries confront new challenges in protecting intellectual property rights within the realm of the Internet especially because of its global “reach” and “relatively unregulated growth” (Salbu, 1998, p. 434). The main problem for the holder of intellectual property rights is establishing jurisdiction over a party who infringes intellectual property rights via the Internet.

When an infringer operates away from the jurisdiction in which the intellectual property rights are registered, the holder of those rights will usually have to cover the cost of litigating in a foreign venue (Rieder & Pappas, 1998). International intellectual property rights regulations are intended to establish harmony among nations in terms of minimum standards of protection and to regulate questions relating to jurisdiction. The two main international regimes are the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) which hosts several multinational agreements and the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) under the auspices of the World Trade Organization (WTO) (Drahoa, 2005).

The question for consideration, however, is whether or not international conventions on intellectual property rights protection are sufficient for dealing with the complex issues associated with infringement via the Internet.