French copyright law is rooted in the droit d’auteur tradition and is principally governed by the Intellectual Property Code (Code de la propriété intellectuelle). French copyright law is rooted in the droit d’auteur tradition and is principally governed by the Intellectual Property Code (Code de la propriété intellectuelle). This approach places the author at the centre of protection. Copyright arises automatically upon creation and does not require formal registration. French law distinguishes between economic rights (droits patrimoniaux), which allow authors to control and benefit from the exploitation of their works, and moral rights (droits moraux), which protect the personal relationship between the author and the work (Intellectual Property Code, Articles L.111-1 and following).
Economic rights allow authors to authorise or prohibit uses of their works, notably reproduction and communication to the public, subject to statutory exceptions and limitations. As a general rule, these rights last throughout the author’s lifetime and for 70 years after death. Moral rights protect the author’s name, authorship and the integrity of the work and also include the rights of disclosure and withdrawal. A distinctive feature of French law is that moral rights are perpetual, inalienable and imprescriptible (Intellectual Property Code, Articles L.121-1 to L.121-4 and L.123-1).
The French framework also recognises neighbouring rights (droits voisins), notably for performers, phonogram and videogram producers, and audiovisual communication undertakings. National law operates within a broader international and European framework, including the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, the principal international treaty establishing common standards for copyright protection across its contracting parties, and successive European Union directives. The Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (Directive (EU) 2019/790) has been particularly important in adapting copyright and neighbouring rights to online uses and platform-based distribution. France transposed the Directive’s neighbouring right for press publishers in 2019, providing a legal basis for remuneration claims when protected press content is reused by online services. Subsequent negotiations between French press publishers and major digital platforms over the remuneration of protected press content have made neighbouring rights one of the most visible examples of the adaptation of copyright to the platform economy.
Digital transformation has also reshaped copyright enforcement. Since 2022, the Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication (Autorité de régulation de la communication audiovisuelle et numérique, Arcom), created through the merger of the CSA (France’s former audiovisual regulatory authority) and Hadopi (the authority previously responsible for combating online copyright infringement), has been responsible for protecting copyrighted works and combating online piracy. Its powers include measures against services that seriously and repeatedly infringe copyright or neighbouring rights, as well as mechanisms targeting illegal streaming and mirror sites. The creation of Arcom reflects a broader shift from enforcement focused primarily on individual peer-to-peer users towards action against the infrastructures and services facilitating large-scale infringement (Arcom, Promouvoir et protéger la création).
Collective management organisations remain central to the practical administration of copyright and neighbouring rights. Bodies such as SACEM (Société des auteurs, compositeurs et éditeurs de musique), which manages the rights of music authors, composers and publishers; SACD (Société des auteurs et compositeurs dramatiques), which represents authors of dramatic, theatrical and audiovisual works; and SCAM (Société civile des auteurs multimédia), which represents authors working in documentary, audiovisual, literary, journalistic and multimedia fields, collect and distribute royalties and represent rights holders in their respective sectors. Their role has become increasingly important as the multiplication of broadcasting, streaming and online uses has made individual rights management more complex. Their activities are governed by the Intellectual Property Code and the European legal framework on collective rights management.
Private copying remuneration (rémunération pour copie privée) is another significant feature of the French system. It compensates rights holders for certain private reproductions of protected works through remuneration collected on eligible recording and storage media. The mechanism also has a direct cultural-policy dimension: under Article L.324-17 of the Intellectual Property Code, collective management organisations must use 25% of the sums derived from private copying remuneration to support artistic creation, the dissemination of live performance, artistic and cultural education, and artist training. Private copying remuneration therefore serves both as a compensation mechanism for rights holders and as a source of funding for cultural activity (Intellectual Property Code, Article L.324-17; Ministry of Culture, Commission pour la rémunération de la copie privée).
Furthermore, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a major focus of French copyright policy. The central issues concern the use of protected works to train generative AI models, the ability of rights holders to identify and control such uses, transparency regarding training data, and the conditions under which creators may be remunerated. These questions have moved rapidly from general debate to concrete policy initiatives. In 2025, the Higher Council for Literary and Artistic Property (Conseil supérieur de la propriété littéraire et artistique, CSPLA) published a major report on the remuneration of cultural content used by AI systems. The government also launched a structured dialogue between generative AI developers and representatives of cultural and media rights holders, notably to encourage licensing and contractual arrangements. By the end of 2025, the Ministry of Culture reported that this dialogue had established a framework for negotiation, while progress on value sharing remained limited. (CSPLA, Rapport de mission relative à la rémunération des contenus culturels utilisés par les systèmes d’intelligence artificielle, 2025)
A further issue concerns AI models developed or trained outside Europe but marketed within the European Union. In December 2025, a CSPLA report examined the law applicable to generative AI models commercialised in the European market and concluded that EU copyright law is intended to apply to their training and deployment. In parallel, further CSPLA work has addressed the protection of content generated with the use of generative AI. These developments illustrate a broader shift in French copyright policy: the debate is no longer limited to whether AI challenges authors’ rights, but increasingly concerns the practical enforceability of those rights, transparency over training sources, and the development of remuneration and licensing mechanisms (CSPLA, Rapport de mission sur la loi applicable aux modèles d’IA générative commercialisés dans l’Union européenne, 2025; Ministry of Culture, consultation between AI developers and cultural rights holders, 2025).
For France, the challenge is therefore no longer simply to regulate AI, but to ensure that technological innovation develops without undermining the principles of authorship, fair remuneration and cultural diversity that underpin the droit d’auteur tradition.
Comments are closed.