Who Owns the Blockchain? How Copyright Law Allows Rights Holders to Control Blockchains
Sebastian Pech · Digital Commons at University of Maryland Carey Law (University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law) · 2021
The lack of control by a single authority is an oft-described characteristic of blockchain technology.This article shows the extent to which US and EU copyright law protects information stored on a blockchain and the manner by which rights holders are able to control blockchains.While the two legal systems are almost identical in terms of protection of individual information stored on a blockchain, there are significant differences in the protection of the compilation of information.Because of the EU sui generis rights for non-original databases, both the operator of a blockchain and participants in the blockchain network can have rights in the compilation of information stored on the blockchain.Therefore, they can both prevent acts necessary for the operation of a blockchain.Since this impedes the development and use, this article argues for an exception for acts that are necessary for the normal use of a blockchain.Pech (DO NOT DELETE) 3/15/2021 4:16 PM Who Owns the Blockchain? 60 Journal of Business & Technology Law the pseudonym, 3 the underlying technology, blockchain, is said to revolutionize almost every part of our lives.4Nakamato's idea behind Bitcoin was to create a payment system that would function without any need for a trusted third party to supervise transactions.5 Based on this, the Bitcoin website states that "nobody owns or controls Bitcoin" 6 and the lack of control by a single authority is an oft-described characteristic of blockchain technology.7 However, this general statement only applies to public 8 blockchains like the one used by Bitcoin.In this case, everyone can access existing information and add new information.9 On the contrary, private 10 blockchains have a supervising entity that grants only selected actors access and editing rights, thus offering more possibilities to control the blockchain.11 Furthermore, if aspects of a blockchain are protected by intellectual property (IP) rights, especially copyright law, rights holders can use these rights to assert control.This applies to both private and public blockchains.The question of copyright ownership has arisen only recently with respect to Bitcoin.In April 2019, Craig Wright, an Australian computer scientist and self-3.See Billy Bambrough, John McAfee Thinks He's Solved Bitcoin's Greatest Mystery -Who Is Satoshi Nakamoto?, FORBES (May 5, 2020) 7:10 EDT,