Secondary Copyright Infringement

18 June 2010

By Ben Evans

Secondary infringement of copyright occurs when the infringer has not himself committed the infringement i.e. he has not made the copy but has instead used the infringing copy in some way.

Under section 22 of the CDPA copyright is infringed by a person who (without a licence) imports into the UK (other than for his own private or domestic use) an article which is an infringing copy of a work. Importantly in order to show secondary infringement the importer must know or have reason to believe that the article is an infringing copy.

As an interesting consideration to the domestic use point is section 17, under section 17 it is not legal to record a copy of a work i.e. copy a cd. But under section 22 it is legal to own one.

Section 23 says that copyright in a work is infringed by a person who (without a licence): possesses in the course of business; sells or lets for hire; exhibits or distributes in the course of business or distributes an article (other than in the course of business) that prejudicially affects the copyright owner. In summary then any dealing in an infringing copy is illegal (not surprisingly).

Section 24 says that copyright in a work is infringed by a person who (without a licence): makes; imports into the UK; possesses in the course of business or sells or lets for hire (or offers the same) articles designed to copy work.

Section 25 provides that where copyright in a work is infringed in a place of public entertainment then any person who gave permission for that place to be used for the performance is liable for infringement unless when the permission was given he reasonably believed that there would be no such infringements.

Finally on secondary infringement section 26 provides that where copyright is infringed by public performance by means of apparatus then the person who supplied the apparatus is liable if he knew or had reason to believe that the apparatus was likely to be used to infringe copyright, an occupier of the property where the performance took place is liable if he knew or had reason to believe that the apparatus was to be used to infringe copyright, finally a person who supplied a copy of a sound recording used to infringe copyright is liable if he knew or had reason to believe that it was likely to be used to infringe copyright.

Ben Evans is a trainee solicitor at Lawdit.