On October 10 of this year, at the regular plenary meeting of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis, the Ministry of Justice submitted to parliament a bill on strengthening the protection of intellectual property in the digital environment.

This presentation was misinterpreted on some social media pages. False and unsubstantiated information is spreading online that the Deputy Minister of Justice allegedly stated that “responsibility for violation of intellectual property on the Internet lies with "O‘zkomnazorat" and its current head Agzam Abdullayev is not fulfilling his duties satisfactorily.”

In his speech, Deputy Minister of Justice M. Ikramov emphasized that in recent years a number of important reforms in the field of intellectual property have been implemented in our country and in order to further strengthen the protection of intellectual property it is necessary to make changes and additions to some existing legal documents.

In particular, in recent years, cases of illegal use of intellectual property in the digital environment have become more frequent; the department reported that in 2022, 31% of cases of violation of copyright and related rights were committed on the Internet.

In fact, the rules related to intellectual property are defined only in special laws and are not sufficiently reflected in legislative documents in other areas.

As a result, representatives of these industries and the population do not develop a sense of respect for intellectual property, and violations of intellectual property rights continue.

The reason for the above violations, in particular, is the absence in the laws regulating the field of information technology of a clear provision that the owner of a website page, a blogger, cannot illegally use intellectual property on the Internet, including on social networks.

As the Deputy Minister noted, based on the strategy for the development of the sphere of intellectual property and Article 53 of the Constitution of the Republic of Uzbekistan, the introduction of an addition to the Law of the Republic of Uzbekistan “On Informatization”, providing for increased personal responsibility of the owner of an information resource, is very relevant.

The amendments and additions proposed to the bill are designed to prevent the illegal use of intellectual property on websites, social networks and other information resources, as well as to ensure effective protection of rights to intellectual property in the information and communication environment.

It should be noted that the speech of the Deputy Minister at the regular plenary meeting of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis does not correspond to the information presented in some telegram channels.

For information, you can also watch the full plenary session on YouTube.

REMINDER that the dissemination of lies and fabrications that embarrass another person (slander) is the basis for administrative and criminal liability (Article 40 of the Administrative Responsibility Code and Article 139 of the Criminal Code).

 

Public relations department
Ministry of Justice