By TAKUMI WAKAI/ Staff Writer
February 21, 2023 at 12:00 JST
Hiroko Ashiyama attends an online government meeting with his computerized representation. (Provided by Hiroko Ashiyama)
Debate has started in Japan regarding whether individuals can legally stop others from using their computerized alter egos in cyberspace.
There have been reports of third parties pretending to be someone else by copying their avatar in the virtual environment.
The government organized a public-private online meeting on Jan. 26 to discuss the rights to portraits and other intellectual properties in the metaverse.
One of the meeting’s attendees was avatar user Hiroko Ashiyama, who said his alter ego is based on an illustration using his face and that his cyber representation should be protected under portrait rights.
A report will be worked out based on the discussions by March, at the earliest.
The government is also planning to submit to the current ordinary Diet session a revision to the Unfair Competition Prevention Law in the hopes of prohibiting copied articles in the metaverse from being sold.
Metaverse users move their computerized representations created from illustrations and images on their monitors. They can enjoy the metaverse, including having their avatars don clothing they like, just like in the real world.
However, problems have been reported regarding avatar designs being copied for unauthorized use.
The metaverse market was worth 5 trillion yen ($38.9 billion) in 2021 and is projected to reach up to 87 trillion yen by 2050, according to the Cabinet Office.
A succession of businesses have released metaverse-related offerings and an increasing number of people are using the metaverse.
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