NATIONAL LEGISLATION ON THE PROTECTION OF COPYRIGHT IN SOFTWARE INVOLVING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: ISSUES AND WAYS TO IMPROVE THE FRAMEWORK

Abstract

The article examines the problematic aspects of current Ukrainian legislation in the field of copyright protection for artificial intelligence software and formulates concrete proposals for its improvement. The relevance of the topic is driven by the rapid growth in the use of generative artificial intelligence: according to Gartner estimates, as early as 2022 AI was generating approximately 10% of all digital content worldwide, underscoring the urgent need for adequate legal regulation. It is established that the traditional model of protecting computer programs as literary works, enshrined in the Civil Code of Ukraine and the Law of Ukraine «On Copyright and Related Rights», despite its compliance with international standards, is insufficient to regulate objects autonomously generated by artificial intelligence systems without direct human creative participation. The introduction of the sui generis right for such objects under Article 33 of the said Law represents the world’s first example of a special legislative protection regime; however, the current version contains a number of significant shortcomings. A separate focus is placed on the conflict between rights granted under Ukrainian law and the terms of agreements with global AI platforms, which effectively devalue those rights through broad irrevocable licences. The European Union’s experience – Regulation 2024/1689 (EU AI Act) and Directive 2019/790/EU (DSM), is analysed as a benchmark for reforming national legislation, and a twostage harmonisation roadmap with EU acquis is considered, envisaging first the introduction of soft regulatory instruments and subsequently the adoption of a national law on artificial intelligence. Based on the findings, seven avenues for legislative improvement are proposed: replacing the protectability criterion with «individual character» by analogy with EU law; introducing voluntary state registration; limiting the scope of protection to literal copying only; mandatory labelling of AI-generated objects with a special symbol; legislative definition of a list of excluded objects; resolution of the conflict with platform agreements; and phased harmonisation with EU acquis.