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Artificial Intelligence Is Breaking Patent Law


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Illustration shows two robot hands building a structure.

Nations should also create an international treaty to ensure that these laws follow standardized principles.

Credit: Ana Kova

Within a few years, numerous inventions could involve artificial intelligence (AI), which could create one of the biggest threats patent systems have faced. Patent law is based on the assumption that inventors are human; it currently struggles to deal with an inventor that is a machine.

Courts around the world are wrestling with this problem as patent applications naming an AI system as the inventor have been lodged in more than 100 countries. If courts and governments decide that AI-made inventions cannot be patented, the implications could be huge. Rather than forcing old patent laws to accommodate new technology, we propose that national governments design bespoke IP law—AI-IP—that protects AI-generated inventions.

From Nature
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