Copyright and related rights

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Copyright

Copyright protects original works and grants their creator legal prerogatives. That means that any materialised and original work such as, for example, paintings, photographs, drawings, literature, films, lyrics, musical scores, elements of websites, textbooks, software, architectural buildings or any other type of original work may be protected by copyright.

Copyright does not protect ideas, operating methods, concepts or information as such.

Copyright protection implies that any reproduction, distribution or communication of a work to the public must, obligatorily, be authorised in writing by the author or the rights holder. If several authors or rights holders exist, it is necessary to obtain prior written authorisation from all of the authors or rights holders.

No formal registration procedure is required to get protection by copyright or related rights. Indeed, copyright arises from the simple fact of creating the work. Creators thus automatically acquire rights over their works, enabling them to control subsequent use by third parties.

The protection prevails for the duration of the author's life and for 70 years after their death, to the benefit of their beneficiaries or the rights holders.

Related rights

Related rights are similar to copyright in the rights that they confer. Their objective is to protect the artistic or financial contribution invested in the literary and artistic creation. In Luxembourg, related rights are granted to phonogram producers, to film producers, to performers, to broadcasters and to newspaper publishers on their online publications.

Protection by related rights implies that any recording, reproduction or communication to the public of a work must obligatorily obtain prior authorisation from the rights holder.

The holder of the related rights is granted an exclusive right to authorise the recording, communication to the public and the direct or indirect reproduction of their performances. It is therefore necessary to obtain authorisation from the rights holder prior to any use of a performance that is protected by a related right. If several rights holders exist, it is necessary to obtain prior authorisation from all of the rights holders.

As with copyright, no formal registration procedure is required to get protection by related rights. Related rights arise automatically from the execution, recording or production of the performance.

The duration of protection from related rights varies according to the invoked right.  

Exceptions to copyright and related rights

In certain cases, the law exempts users from requesting authorisation from the rights holders for reproducing or communicating protected works to the public.

The exceptions and limitations thus constitute situations in which the reproduction and/or communication of a work to the public is authorised, without requesting prior authorisation from the author of or the rights holders on this work.

These exceptions and limitations are listed exhaustively by national legislation. Each exception to or limitation of copyright and related rights only applies under specific conditions. It is advisable to check that these conditions are met if you wish to be able to invoke the application of an exception or limitation of copyright and related rights. If one of the conditions is not met, the use of the work without having obtained prior authorisation would in fact constitute an infringement of the copyright or related rights.

Proof related to a certain date

Proof of the date of creation may be provided by any means.

In certain cases, it may be useful to fulfil certain formalities that will permit the creators to prove the date of creation of the work or any type of content.

For this purpose, the Benelux Office for Intellectual Property (BOIP) offers a solution called i-DEPOT. An i-DEPOT (i-REGISTRATION) makes it possible to demonstrate that a work or content existed on a specific date. An i-DEPOT is proof, provided by the OBPI, of the existence of a work, of a document or any other type of content on the date it was received. The documents are retained by the Office for a duration of 5 or 10 years, depending on the period chosen by the applicant (the retention period may be extended by five additional years).

Competent bodies to grant licences in Luxembourg

In Luxembourg, there are bodies that collectively manage copyright, which, acting on the authors' and rights holders' behalf, issue licences in exchange for payment: