Recently, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) launched a new business service: WIPO PROOF. It is an efficient tool that can generate evidence to prove that the digital file of a certain asset already exists at a specific point in time, which helps to reduce the risk of future legal disputes and lays the foundation for the final registration of any formal intellectual property rights. As the first "international certification" recognized by WIPO member states, this move is of great significance.
WIPO PROOF helps innovators and creators to take verifiable actions to provide tamper-proof evidence of the existence of any digital file in any format, including data sets, at a certain point in time. It provides protection for their large amount of labor results in the process from conceptual development to commercialization, thereby supplementing WIPO's existing intellectual property systems. In today's increasingly digital world, innovation and creative activities often take the form of global collaboration, generating large amounts of data files containing valuable content that may be easily abused or misappropriated. Such content may range from trade secrets to scripts, musical scores and other creative works, to research results, large data sets, artificial intelligence algorithms, or any commercial records.
Director General Gurry launches WIPO's latest online service WIPO PROOF for innovative creators
All these contents should be treated as intellectual assets, and should be independently recorded in a secure manner at each stage of development, regardless of whether they eventually become formal intellectual property rights.
In this regard, WIPO Director General Gurry pointed out that in a rapidly changing global economy, value is increasingly dependent on human activities driven by digital technology and big data. It is vital to prove that you have your own digital files of your intellectual assets. WIPO PROOF helps innovators and creators to better protect their digital achievements, marking an important step taken by WIPO in expanding its package of services for the needs of the digital economy.
WIPO PROOF provides some form of digital notarization service by generating date and time stamp fingerprints of digital files, providing credible, cost-effective and efficient services on a global scale. WIPO PROOF has joined WIPO's market-oriented intellectual property services for patents, trademarks, industrial designs, geographical indications, arbitration and mediation.
About WIPO PROOF
WIPO PROOF is a convenient and easy-to-use global online service that can quickly generate tamper-proof evidence to prove that a digital file has existed at a certain point in time and has not been modified since it existed. The WIPO PROOF token created by this service, which is a digital fingerprint of the date and time stamp of a certain file or data, can be used as evidence in legal disputes. WIPO PROOF tokens can be purchased one at a time for a small fee, or multiple tokens can be purchased in a package at a discounted price, valid for two years.
WIPO PROOF can be used to establish pre-existence, help prevent abuse and misappropriation, and help provide protection for intellectual assets at each stage of development from concept to commercialization, regardless of whether they eventually become formal intellectual property rights. WIPO PROOF complements WIPO’s existing intellectual property systems and provides another tool for the strategic global management of intellectual assets.
WIPO PROOF has a variety of applications, including: for trade secret strategies, the use of WIPO PROOF to prove the existence of documents or data at a specific point in time. This is a concrete action that emphasizes the value of files or data and shows that measures have been taken to protect them. Regarding creative works, whether it can prove the existence of the creative work at the time of creation is the basis for protecting the work from possible misappropriation or infringement.
WIPO PROOF is also useful in managing valuable data sets (such as scientific research data or data used to train artificial intelligence models) because the existence and attribution information of each iteration of the data set can be formally recorded in a few seconds.
WIPO PROOF’s work process
Anyone can visit the secure online website of WIPO PROOF and request a WIPO PROOF token for a specific digital file.
The secure, one-way algorithm of WIPO PROOF interacts locally with the requester’s browser to create a unique digital fingerprint for the file. In addition, anyone, even a third party, can verify the WIPO PROOF token on the website by following a few simple steps.
WIPO PROOF uses public key infrastructure (PKI) technology to generate WIPO PROOF tokens. PKI technology is a mature and reliable encryption technology and one of the most widely accepted and recognized digital authentication methods in the world. In addition, WIPO PROOF is designed and developed according to the eIDAS standard, which is one of the most robust and stringent standards in the world. The WIPO PROOF token can provide the highest level of certainty: the date and time on the token are accurate and have never been tampered with. When disputes and litigation arise due to the existence and integrity of digital files and related intellectual property rights, WIPO PROOF can provide reliable and verifiable evidence.
About WIPO
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is a major global forum for the promotion of intellectual property policies, services, information and cooperation. As a specialized agency of the United Nations, WIPO assists its 193 member states in formulating an international intellectual property legal framework that takes into account the interests of all parties to meet the needs of the continuous development of society. It provides business services related to obtaining intellectual property rights and resolving disputes in multiple countries. It also provides capacity-building programs to help developing countries benefit from the use of intellectual property rights. In addition, it also provides free access to a unique knowledge base of intellectual property information.
Source: World Intellectual Property Organization official website
https://www.wipo.int/pressroom/zh/articles/2020/article_0012.html
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