Cook Islands

Section 5 binds the Crown, and section 8 gives the owner of copyright in a work the exclusive right to copy, publish, perform or display in public, distribute, adapt, and communicate the work to the public. Section 9 makes it an infringement to do any of those acts without the owner's permission and other than under one of the exceptions in sections 14 to 25.

Section 3 defines a literary work to include a computer program, and a collective work to include a compilation of data, including in electronic or other machine-readable form, so a database attracts protection here only as a collective work under ordinary copyright, not under a separate sui generis database right.

Section 22 lets the lawful owner of a copy of a computer program make a single copy or adaptation without the copyright owner's authorisation, but only to use the program for the purpose it was obtained, for archival purposes, or to replace a lost or destroyed copy, and any such copy must be destroyed once it no longer meets those conditions.

Section 44 makes it an offence to manufacture or import for sale or rental a device or means designed to circumvent a technological measure that prevents or restricts copying of a work, sound recording, or communication to the public, or that enables reception of an encrypted broadcast by a person not entitled to receive it.

Sections 4 and 5 require a person renting or exhibiting film to the public to hold a renter's or exhibitor's licence issued by the Minister. Sections 16 to 18 require every film to be approved by a censor before public exhibition, and the censor may approve a film generally, refuse approval, require excisions, or approve it subject to exhibition being restricted to a specified class of persons. Section 23 extends the same approval requirement to video tapes sold or rented to the public.

Sections 28 to 31 give the censor the function of classifying a document or sound recording as indecent, as not indecent, or as indecent unless its circulation is restricted to a specified age or class of persons, considering among other things the age groups to or among whom it is likely to be distributed.

Section 32 makes it an offence to sell, deliver by way of hire, or possess for sale or hire any indecent document or sound recording, and separately an offence to sell, deliver, give, exhibit, or offer to a person under the age of 18 years any document or sound recording which is indecent. Section 25 makes it an offence for a renter's licence holder to rent a video tape otherwise than in accordance with the section 23 approval requirement. The Act is administered by the Crown Law Office through an appointed Chief Censor.

Section 16(1) permits a person to quote from a work that has already been lawfully made available to the public without infringing copyright, provided the amount quoted is justifiable given the purpose of the quotation, does not unreasonably prejudice the copyright owner's legitimate interests, and is accompanied by an acknowledgement of the work and the author's name where it appears in the source.

Section 21(1) separately permits copying or communicating to the public a newspaper article, periodical, communication to the public, lecture, speech, or similar work, and excerpts of a work seen or heard in the course of reporting a current event, for the purpose of reporting current events to the public, without the copyright owner's authorisation.

Section 21(2) requires that the amount copied or communicated be no more than is justifiable for that purpose and that the source and author be acknowledged, and section 21(3) withdraws the permission where the copyright owner has expressly prohibited copying or communicating the work for that purpose.

Section 41 makes intentional infringement or breach of a protected right for a profit-making purpose an offence punishable on conviction by a fine not exceeding $50,000 or imprisonment for not more than 2 years, or both, for an individual, or a fine not exceeding $100,000 for any other person, and section 39 separately entitles a rights owner to bring a civil action for damages and expenses.