데이터베이스의 저작권 침해 판단 방법론 개선에 대한 시론적 검토

Abstract

The Copyright Act recognizes a database as a type of copyrighted work and protects the copyrights of databases as authorship works. It is notable that what is protected under the Copyright Act is not the database itself but the creative expression among its various elements. However, databases, particularly electronic databases, have unique characteristics that make them difficult to perceive and understand compared to other forms of expression. Furthermore, databases are often used in the intermediate stages rather than the final stages, hindering discussions on copyrights for databases. Various legal cases have revealed the absence of effective and reasonable similarity measurement models to prove copyright infringements or violations of other legl rights related to databases. The absence of models makes it difficult to adequately respond to increasing rights infringements and weakens the protection of legitimate rights holders. This study explores directions for developing a reasonable similarity measurement model to address this issue, specifically the direction of deriving a comparison algorithm that is applicable to the problems and various factors of creative expression.