Italy: Tools to protect the IP of websites
The first IP tool that may be considered is a design application, aimed to protect the overall appearance and layout of the site. A registered Community design application can be filed before the European Union Intellectual Property Office as well as under Italian IP law.
Designs can protect the overall appearance of a website as defined by the contour lines, the colours, and the arrangement of the text or graphic elements. The protection of the site’s layout allows the owner to block a copy of the layout itself, independently from the programming code in which a website is written.
Under Community and Italian design law, the owner has a one-year grace period after the first presentation to the public to validly file the design application. Therefore, the design owner can file an application within one year after the website has started running.
If the website has some kind of function or intelligence inside it, the proper IP tool to activate is the filing of one or more patent application related to an invention carried out by software. The European Patent Office calls these computer-implemented inventions.
