🚀 go-pugleaf

     This is to continue my earlier posting on copyrights and viruses,
based upon _How to Copyright Software_ by M.J. Salone.  This posting
is in regards to derivative works; for example, a disassembly of a
virus made by someone other than the virus author.

     Congress defines the term 'derivative work'as "a work based upon
one or more pre-existing works." [17 USC Sec. 101] A virus disassembly
would probably fall under this definition because the opcodes are
presumably from the actual virus even though the descriptive comments
are the creative input of the person disassembling it.  The above
definition is likely to apply if a disassembly is considered to be a
translation of the virus.  The question then becomes "Is the
disassembly author required to get the permission of the person who
holds the copyright (usually the author) before publishing the
disassembly?"  The answer is, technically, yes.

     However, the absence of a copyright notice could be a legitimate
excuse for assuming that the virus is public domain; this is backed up
by the fact that viruses are designed to replicate themselves without
consent of the user.  Items within the public domain are free to be
used and distributed in any way.  Derivative works of public domain
items can be copyrighted as long as the new material is substantial
enough to be considered original.  As far as disassemblies are
concerned, the aforementioned descriptive comments are original
material and can thus be copyrighted (i.e. the whole disassembly).

     Of course there is the question of whether-or-not a virus is
considered to be properly copyrightable anyway, as other contributors
to Virus-L have noted.  Viruses install themselves into other
programs, thus creating aunauthorized derivative works in the process!

     Please note that, if the above is untrue, then the disassembly
can not be published without the consent of the virus' copyright
holder.  The copyright holder of a work solely has the right to
publish derivative works based upon his/her original publication
during the duration of the copyright.

     In my opinion the disassembly is copyrightable because the virus
is in the public domain (since copyright notices are not normally
found in viruses; not to mention that viruses may themselves be
somewhat illegal).  I I doubt that a virus author would sue for
infringement because, as I said in my previous posting, that the virus
author is likely to incrimminate himself by doing so.

[Ed. For what it's worth, I believe that some versions of the Brain
virus included a copyright notice in the ASCII header.]

     My next posting will contain a discussion on what rights are
protected by a copyright.

DISCLAIMER:  The above are my opinions.  I'm not a lawyer :-)  Please do
             not take this material to be the law.