--- title: "Data and Database Rights Protection | Pitch" description: "How to protect the data and databases you build, through database rights, trade secrets, copyright and the contracts that hold them together." url: https://www.pitch.law/solutions/data-and-database-rights-protection --- [pitch](https://www.pitch.law/) [Solutions](https://www.pitch.law/solutions) [Information Technology](https://www.pitch.law/solution-categories/information-technology) # Data and Database Rights Protection How to protect the data and databases you build, through database rights, trade secrets, copyright and the contracts that hold them together. - 360 stage: Protect ## The question Your data may be the most valuable thing you own, and the least protected. A customer database, a curated price feed, a sensor archive or a training set can represent years of investment. None of them comes with a registration certificate. The questions we hear are practical. Can we stop a competitor scraping our catalogue? Who owns the data that a supplier enriches for us? Does the new Data Act force us to hand over what our connected products generate? Can an AI developer train on our content? Clients typically come to us in one of four situations: after a competitor or partner has copied a dataset, before they sign a collaboration or data-sharing agreement, when a product starts generating data that customers want access to, or when an investor or buyer asks what the company really owns in its data. ## Our approach We start by mapping what you hold and where its value lies. Protection for data is a combination of rights, not a single one. We look at each layer in turn. The sui generis database right under Directive 96/9/EC protects a substantial investment in obtaining, verifying or presenting the contents of a database. Copyright may protect the original selection or arrangement of a database and the software around it. Trade secret law (Directive 2016/943) protects data that is secret, valuable because it is secret, and subject to reasonable steps to keep it secret. We explain the conditions and the gaps in [database rights and trade secrets](https://www.pitch.law/academy/database-rights-and-trade-secrets). Then we test the contracts. Most disputes about data are decided by what the parties wrote down, or failed to write down. We review your customer, supplier, employment and collaboration agreements against a playbook for data clauses with [our contract review](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/clause-library-risk-review). The tool flags the issues per clause and proposes redlines. A lawyer checks every suggestion. Next we look at the regulatory overlay. The [EU Data Act](https://www.pitch.law/academy/eu-data-act) gives users of connected products rights of access to the data those products generate, and it limits the database right for such data. If you make connected products or provide related services, this changes your contracts. If you use AI, the questions of [training data, opt-outs and AI output](https://www.pitch.law/academy/ai-intellectual-property-training-data-copyright-disclosure) matter for what you protect and for what you may use. In practice the work runs in steps. We first collect the facts from you: what the dataset contains, how it was compiled, what it cost in time and money, who has access, and under which contracts it leaves the company. Our attorney then decides which rights are realistically available, because an exclusive right exists only where its legal conditions are met. The contract review follows, and the attorney decides which redlines to propose and which risks you may accept. Where a protected asset needs drafting, such as a data access agreement, an addendum for a collaboration or an internal confidentiality policy, we prepare it with [our Document Studio](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/contract-studio) in the firm's house style. Your copyright works and registered rights are recorded in [our IP portfolio](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/portfolio-renewals), so that the whole position is visible in one place. ## What you get - A short map of your data assets, the rights that apply to each and the gaps. - A review of key agreements, with redlines on ownership of derived data, access, use restrictions, confidentiality and return or deletion. - Drafted or updated terms for collaborations, data access, website and API use, and employee and contractor confidentiality. - An assessment of how the Data Act affects your products, services and contracts, where it applies. - A practical protection checklist: access controls, marking of confidential material, records of the investment that supports a database right, and what to do when you suspect extraction. - If an infringement occurs, advice on the options: a cease-and-desist letter, contractual remedies, interim relief or a claim. A short scenario shows the result. A European provider of market data has a catalogue that a reseller has been copying into its own product. We document the investment behind the catalogue, check the reseller agreement, find that it grants no restriction on onward use, and prepare a cease-and-desist letter based on the database right and the contract. For the future, we add use restrictions, audit rights and a clear ban on extraction to its standard terms. We do not promise that every dataset can be protected by an exclusive right. Some cannot. In those cases we say so and show you what contract and technical measures can do instead. ## Next step Tell us which data you rely on and where it travels. A first conversation is usually enough to say which rights you can count on and which contracts need attention. [Schedule a meeting](https://www.pitch.law/schedule) or [contact us](https://www.pitch.law/contact-us). ## In short - Database right, copyright and trade secrets used together - Ownership of data settled in your contracts - Confidentiality measures that stand up in court - A clear position on data created in collaborations - Review of the AI and Data Act terms you sign ## Technology we use - [Technology](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/clause-library-risk-review) ### [Contract Review](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/clause-library-risk-review) [Send us the contract the other side drafted and we check it clause by clause against our playbook, with a risk ranking an attorney has verified.](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/clause-library-risk-review) - [Technology](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/contract-studio) ### [Document Studio](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/contract-studio) [Our Document Studio drafts and analyses legal documents in a secure, on-premise environment, and keeps the documents behind your matters up to date as new data comes in and procedural steps fall due.](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/contract-studio) - [Technology](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/portfolio-renewals) ### [IP Portfolio, Renewals and Deadlines](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/portfolio-renewals) [Your trademarks, designs, domain names and patents in one view, with deadlines docketed, renewals batched and every computed date confirmed by a person.](https://www.pitch.law/technologies/portfolio-renewals) ## Background reading - [Academy](https://www.pitch.law/academy/database-rights-and-trade-secrets) ### [Database Rights and Trade Secrets](https://www.pitch.law/academy/database-rights-and-trade-secrets) [How the EU database right, copyright and trade secret law protect data and databases, what each requires, and where contracts must fill the gaps.](https://www.pitch.law/academy/database-rights-and-trade-secrets) - [Academy](https://www.pitch.law/academy/eu-data-act) ### [The EU Data Act](https://www.pitch.law/academy/eu-data-act) [What Regulation (EU) 2023/2854 requires of makers and users of connected products, data holders, cloud providers and anyone who contracts about data, and when each part applies.](https://www.pitch.law/academy/eu-data-act) - [Academy](https://www.pitch.law/academy/ai-intellectual-property-training-data-copyright-disclosure) ### [AI and Intellectual Property: Training Data, Copyright and Disclosure](https://www.pitch.law/academy/ai-intellectual-property-training-data-copyright-disclosure) [How EU copyright law and the AI Act treat training data, rights holders' opt-outs, training summaries, and the protection of AI-generated output and inventions.](https://www.pitch.law/academy/ai-intellectual-property-training-data-copyright-disclosure) ## More in Information Technology - ### [AI Act Compliance](https://www.pitch.law/solutions/ai-act-compliance) [We help you find out which of your AI systems fall under the EU AI Act, in what role, and what you must have in place and by when.](https://www.pitch.law/solutions/ai-act-compliance) ## Let’s talk Tell us what you’re working on. We’ll get the right person on it and reply within one business day. The first chat is free. [Schedule a meeting](https://www.pitch.law/schedule)