Intellectual Property is intangible personal property that, as the name implies, is created by the mind. The four most recognized types of IP rights are copyrights, trademarks, patents, and trade secrets. Like tangible property, the law recognizes the right to own, license, and sell IP, but IP must be protected to ensure that you can take advantage of those rights! ​ Other IP rights include the right to your likeness, protections for certain varieties of plant, design patents, and more!

There are different methods of protection for each form of IP. It is important to ensure that you take the right steps to protect your creations so you don’t lose out on your rights! Trademarks require policing, patents have strict deadlines, and trade secrets need to be kept secret! The experienced attorneys at Chernoff Vilhauer can help you build a strategy to ensure that you can take full advantage of your IP rights!

A patent is the legal right granted by the United States to an inventor or assignee, providing the exclusive rights to make, use, and sell an invention for a limited period of time and prevent or permit anybody else from doing the same.

A trademark is a name, design, sound, picture, or any other device that a person or business can use to identify themselves in the sale of specific goods or services.

A copyright is the legal right granted by the United States that gives the owner the exclusive rights to reproduce, distribute, perform, display, transmit, and prepare derivative versions of a protected work and to prevent or permit others from doing the same.

A trade secret is valuable information that a business or person takes steps to keep confidential and uses to maintain a competitive advantage. Coca-Cola Company’s secret formula is a great example! Trade secrets can include formulas, recipes, manufacturing processes, customer lists, marketing strategies, or any other confidential business information.

Privacy compliance refers to the legal framework and practices that organizations must follow to protect the privacy of individuals' personal information. It's crucial because it helps you avoid costly legal penalties, maintain your reputation, and build trust with your customers by ensuring their data is handled responsibly.

A patent is the legal right granted by the United States to an inventor or assignee, providing the exclusive rights to make, use, and sell an invention for a limited period of time and prevent or permit anybody else from doing the same.

Patents protect new, useful, and nonobvious machines, compositions of matter, processes, or devices or innovations to the same. If you obtain a patent, then you have the exclusive right to commercialize your innovations for the life of the patent! That means choosing who can make, use, sell, and even import your invention and setting terms for others’ use.

A patent may be obtained by disclosing the invention to the United States and applying for patent protection. But be careful! If your innovation is publicly disclosed more than one year before you file for patent protection, you could lose your patent rights entirely! It is imperative that you consult an IP attorney to ensure that your rights are protected.

A patent lasts for 20 years, starting with the date the patent application is filed. After the expiration date, anybody can use the invention disclosed in the patent.

The scope and the protectability of an issued patent can be quite complex, involving an analysis of the patent's claims, the prior art in the field of the patent, and the history of the patent's prosecution in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The experienced attorneys at Chernoff Vilhauer are adept at conducting this analysis, which is essential before a patent is asserted against any third party or in determining whether you have freedom to operate with minimal risk of patent infringement.

It is important to consult with an experienced patent lawyer even before a cease-and-desist letter is sent to the infringer, or valuable rights could be lost.It is also important not to delay action against infringers, because such a delay may create legal defenses and seriously weaken the remedies available to the patent owner. ​ An early trip to a lawyer may allow you to negotiate a halt to the infringement, but it may be necessary to file a lawsuit to enforce your patent rights.

A trademark is a name, design, sound, picture, or any other device that a person or business can use to identify themselves in the sale of specific goods or services.

Trademark law is designed to protect against consumer confusion by limiting the number of similar marks that are used in commerce for the goods and services the mark is associated with. Trademark rights give the owner the right to stop other parties’ use of confusingly similar marks.

You can obtain a trademark just by using a mark to identify yourself as the source of your goods and services! But registering your trademark with the United States or an individual state provides benefits that operating without a registration does not.

A trademark can last indefinitely so long as you are using it in commerce and policing the use of confusingly similar marks. In order to maintain your trademark rights, you have to take action to prevent others from using confusingly similar marks at the same time you’re using yours. To maintain trademark registration with a state or the US, there are also periodic fees to be paid every few years. ​ While it isn’t a requirement, it is also advisable to include a TM or ® next to your mark.

Registering your trademark can... Create a public record that puts the public on notice of your rights in the trademark; Create a legal presumption that you are the rightful owner of the trademark and have the exclusive right to use the mark; Enable you to file suit or bring other legal action in federal court to obtain remedies for trademark infringement; Create a basis for registering your trademark in other countries; Prevent importation of counterfeit goods into the United States; and Increase the value of your intangible asset portfolio. How should I choose a trademark? From a legal perspective, the less related to the products your trademark is, the stronger the protections are! For example, the word “apple” has no inherent relationship with computers, so Apple, Inc. has a strong trademark. But “Park-N-Fly” has less protection because it is a business that shuttles people from parking lots to airports. If a mark is really descriptive of the services (e.g., “Computer Store”), you may not get any rights in it at all!

If someone infringes your trademark, you can take several actions to protect your rights. You can send a cease-and-desist letter to the infringer, demanding them to stop using your trademark and potentially seeking damages. You and the infringer could come to an agreement to coexist, but if the issue can’t be resolved amicably, you may consider filing a lawsuit against the infringer. On a successful suit, you can get a court order to prevent the owner from using the mark, and if you’re using an ® or TM next to your mark, you may even be able to monetary compensation!

A copyright is the legal right granted by the United States that gives the owner the exclusive rights to reproduce, distribute, perform, display, transmit, and prepare derivative versions of a protected work and to prevent or permit others from doing the same.

Copyrights protect original, creative expression that is fixed in any tangible medium and fits into one of the following categories: literary works; musical works; dramatic works; pantomimes or choreography; pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works; audiovisual works; sound recordings; and architectural works. That includes books, movies, paintings, photographs, advertisements, plays, musical compositions, drawings, short stories, recordings, and so much more! So long as it is creative expression, original to the author, and fixed in some medium, it is protected by copyright! ​ Copyright protection does not extend to anything that could be protected by a patent (procedure, processes, systems, methods, or discoveries) or the ideas underlying the creative expression.

A copyright attaches as soon as a work is fixed into a tangible medium! Registration with the United States is not necessary to obtain copyright protection for new works, but registration does grant additional benefits that you can take advantage of.

For copyrights in works created later than 1978, copyright lasts for the life of the author plus 70 years. If a work was made for hire—to be owned by a person other than the creator—the copyright protections last for 100 years. Works created before 1978 have different durations.

Putting a © on your work is not a requirement for obtaining copyright protections, but including it puts the public on notice that your work is copyrighted. That may help recover more in an infringement lawsuit.

While registration is not a requirement to obtain copyright protections, you cannot bring a civil lawsuit for infringement of a copyright without registering the work with the US Copyright Office. ​ Additionally, if you register your work within 3 months of its first publication, you can elect for a monetary compensation amount set by statute for infringement. Registration also permits you to request that infringing products imported illegally be seized at the border.

It is important to consult with an experienced IP lawyer even before a cease-and-desist letter is sent to the infringer, or valuable rights could be lost.It is also important not to delay action against infringers, because such a delay may create legal defenses and seriously weaken the remedies available to the copyright owner. ​ An early trip to a lawyer may allow you to negotiate a halt to the infringement, but it may be necessary to file a lawsuit to enforce your copyright against the infringer.

A trade secret is valuable information that a business or person takes steps to keep confidential and uses to maintain a competitive advantage. Coca-Cola Company’s secret formula is a great example! Trade secrets can include formulas, recipes, manufacturing processes, customer lists, marketing strategies, or any other confidential business information.

Trade secret law protects against “misappropriation,” meaning using a trade secret for competitive advantage after wrongfully obtaining the information. It does not protect against “proper” acquisition, such as independent discovery or reverse engineering the information from a legally obtained product.

The most important step in protecting trade secrets is to keep the information confidential! Appropriate use of non-disclosure agreements and information security measures proportionate to the sensitivity of the information is imperative to protecting your trade secrets. So long as the information remains confidential and you take reasonable steps to keep it that way, the trade secret can last forever!

It is important not to delay action against misappropriators because such a delay may create legal defenses and seriously weaken the remedies available to the patent owner. If your trade secrets have been misappropriated, you can demand that the appropriator stop all use of the trade secrets and even seek monetary compensation. If you and the appropriator are unable to settle, then you can seek remedy in a court of law to prevent a court order enjoining the appropriator’s use and monetary compensation.

It is important to carefully consider whether your information is better protected as a trade secret or by patent. Patents provide stronger protection, but obtaining patent rights means publicly disclosing the information in an application to the United States or another government. If your application is rejected, then you also lose trade secret rights because your information is now public! ​ The attorneys at Chernoff Vilhauer can help you decide which protections are most appropriate based on the kind of information to be protected.

Privacy compliance refers to the legal framework and practices that organizations must follow to protect the privacy of individuals' personal information. It's crucial because it helps you avoid costly legal penalties, maintain your reputation, and build trust with your customers by ensuring their data is handled responsibly.

Depending on your location and the nature of your business, you may need to comply with various regulations such as GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act), HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), and more. Our team can help you determine which regulations are relevant to your business.

We offer a range of services, including drafting and reviewing public-facing privacy statements, conducting risk assessments, developing comprehensive internal privacy policies and strategies, incident response planning, and ensuring you follow relevant privacy regulations. We tailor our services to meet your specific needs and business objectives.

In the event of a data breach or privacy incident, it's essential to act quickly and responsibly. While Chernoff Vilhauer LLP does not currently offer emergency incident response services, our team can help you develop an incident response strategy that will leave you prepared to handle an emergency should one arise.

Privacy regulations and your business practices evolve over time. It's advisable to review and update your privacy policies at least annually or whenever there are significant changes to your data processing activities or relevant privacy laws.

Our firm combines legal expertise with a deep understanding of the technology and business sectors. We provide practical, strategic, and tailored solutions to meet your specific needs with consideration given to all your business objectives—not just ensuring compliance. We also stay updated on the latest privacy developments to keep you ahead of compliance requirements.

Contact us via phone, email, or our contact page to schedule a consultation. During this initial meeting, we will discuss your specific needs and develop a customized plan to help your business achieve and maintain privacy compliance.