State Council, Protection of Computer Software Regulations

Promulgated: December 20 2001
Effective: January 1 2002
Applicability: For the purposes of these Regulations, "computer software" (hereinafter, software) means computer programs and their related files (Article 2). Software must have been independently developed and fixed on physical media in order to be protected under the Regulations (article 4).

Main contents: The Regulations state that a Chinese citizen, legal person or other organization is entitled under these Regulations to copyright in the software they have developed, regardless of whether the software is published or not. In the case of a piece of software developed by a foreigner or stateless person, the foreign or the stateless person shall also be entitled to copyright under these the Regulations if the software is first published in China, or if the foreigner or stateless person is entitled to the copyright of the software under an agreement between his home country and China or an international treaty to which China is a party (Article 5). However, the protection provided by the Regulations over copyrights in a software does not extend to the idea, process, operating method or mathematical concepts employed in the software (Article 6). The owner of copyright in a piece of software may register the copyright with the competent authority, and the registration certificate shall be the prima facie evidence of the copyright (Article 7). The copyright in a piece of software arises upon the completed development of the software and the term of protection shall be for the life of the developer and 50 years thereafter, if the developer is a natural person or for 50 years if the developer is a legal person or other organization (Article 14). According to the Regulations, copyright in a piece of software includes the right to publish, sign, revise, copy, distribute, lease, transmit by way of an information network and translate the software (Article 8).
Related legislation: PRC, Copyright Law (Revised), Oct 27 2001, CLP 2001 No.10 p53
Repealed legislation: State Council, Protection of Computer Software Regulations, Jun 4 1991