The 2023 Amendment to the Copyright Act and Issues for Digital Archives

Abstract

The 2023 Amendment of the Copyright Act established a new ruling system for works that are not centrally managed and for which the intention of the copyright holder, etc. regarding their use is not clear, in order to facilitate the smooth use of past works and content created by the general public. This system is closely related to digital archiving, and the Agency for Cultural Affairs has identified "cases where rights cannot be processed due to the fact that some copyright holders are unknown or unreachable when digitally archiving past works" as the first situation in which this system can be used. This paper introduces the history of the 2023 revision of the Copyright Act and the outline and issues of the new adjudication system.