“Secondary infringement,” in copyright law, refers to where the defendant has not personally infringed copyright, but is still nonetheless deemed to have infringed. Section 27.1 of the Copyright Act deals with secondary infringement.
A person is deemed to have infringed copyright under one of the four circumstances. He or she
(1) sells or rents out an infringing copy of the protected work (e.g. selling or renting out a pirated DVD),
(2) distributes the material so widely that it prejudices the copyright owner’s right (e.g. putting copyright-protected MP3s on a website for people to download),
(3) displays the infringed materials in public (e.g. showing a movie without proper licence),
(4) imports for sale or for rent materials that would infringe copyright if they were made in Canada (e.g. importing goods that are not authorized to be copied in Canada).
Readers should note that generally it is an infringement to perform any copyright-protected work in public. Therefore, any kind of public display of copyright-protected material without the copyright owner’s consent is generally a bad idea.
In fact, performance for private profit purposes of any copyright-protected materials is a criminal offence under the act, for which a person may be fined or imprisoned or both.
*This article is for information only, and is NOT LEGAL ADVICE. Readers must consult a properly licensed lawyer for legal advice.
