What is Intellectual Property and How is it Registered?

According to Article 18, paragraph 18 of Law 2557/1997, the international term “propriete intellectuelle”/”intellectual property” is translated into Greek as “διανοητική ιδιοκτησία” (“diavnoitiki idioktisia”).

Intellectual property includes both copyright (“propriete litteraire et artistique”/”droit d’auteur”/”copyright”), related rights, and industrial property (“propriete industrielle”/”industrial property”). Intellectual property encompasses the rights arising from the creation of a product of the mind, which constitutes an intangible asset.

Intellectual property protects any original intellectual creation in the field of literature, art, or science, expressed in any form, especially written or spoken texts, musical compositions with or without text, theatrical works with or without music, choreographic works, pantomimes, audiovisual works, works of visual arts, including designs, paintings, sculptures, engravings, lithographs, architectural works, photographs, works of applied arts, illustrations, maps, three-dimensional works related to geography, topography, architecture, or science, translations, adaptations, and other transformations of works or expressions of folklore, collections of works or collections of expressions of folklore or simple facts and elements, such as encyclopedias and anthologies, provided that the selection or arrangement of their content is original.

Related rights arise because in addition to protecting creators, technical progress has created the need to protect performers, artists, producers of sound and/or image carriers, and radio and television organizations. These natural and legal entities contribute significantly to the public performance, reproduction, distribution, or production of certain intellectual works. Due to the technical possibility of recording and the ease of multiplying copies of works, these contributions need protection against unauthorized appropriation and exploitation by third parties.

Rights over industrial property concern inventions, utility models, plant variety rights, trademarks, industrial designs, and protected geographical indications of origin.

How are Intellectual Rights Registered?
To ensure the creator’s rights and to have evidence of authorship, various practices are followed in practice. Two of them are mentioned as examples:

The first involves depositing the intellectual creation with a notary public. The deposit of the work with a notary public provides the evidence of a reliable date, which is freely assessed by the court in case of litigation regarding infringement of rights to this work.

The second approach is sending a registered letter with the sender and recipient being the same creator (or a third-party recipient) (we recommend sending two registered letters), keeping the proof and maintaining the specific letter containing the work, sealed until – and only if – a dispute arises concerning the specific work. In this case, the letter will be opened in court by a judge who will verify its content.

Read more about how long the protection of intellectual property rights lasts and how creators can protect their rights on the official website of the Hellenic Industrial Property Organization.