// wiki · analysis · September 2026
The legal nature of AI models and AI products
Draft article. The qualifications are as of September 2026; doctrine and practice on the status of models continue to form.
A draft for discussion. The law does not name a model as an independent object of rights — the article shows which known regimes it is assembled from in practice and what depends on that.
The short answer
The Civil Code does not identify an “artificial intelligence model” as a distinct object of rights. In practice, products combine established regimes: code as a program, datasets as databases, and weights and architecture potentially as know-how where Civil Code Article 1465’s conditions are met. Classification is practical: it affects the ability to prohibit use of a copy, taxation, transfers in transactions and investor due diligence.
What an AI product consists of
| Layer | Legal regime | What it gives |
|---|---|---|
| Training and inference code | A computer program (Art. 1261 of the Civil Code); registration with Rospatent and the software register | Copyright protection, evidence, the register's VAT benefit |
| Architecture and trained weights | Know-how protection may apply if Civil Code Article 1465 is satisfied, including reasonable confidentiality measures. | Protection against an employee or contractor carrying the weights out |
| Dataset | A database: the maker's related right (Arts. 1333–1334 of the Civil Code) + rights to the elements | Control over extractions, the base for the model's next versions |
| Prompts, instructions, pipelines | Know-how; partly works | Preserving the team's knowledge through turnover |
| The product as a whole (service, API) | A complex; the user is granted access under a contract | Monetisation without transferring the weights themselves |
What the court said
In case No. 02-4220/2025 the court described the neural network as a “computer program” and its result as created “by means of technical devices”. For a dispute about authorship of generations this passed painlessly, but it shows the risk: if the status of the weights is not formalised, the court has nothing to protect except the code. Details — in the article “Who owns an AI generation”.
The working stack of protection
- Protection of information as know-how requires the conditions of Civil Code Article 1465, including reasonable confidentiality measures. One approach is a trade-secret regime with the measures in Article 10 of Law No. 98-FZ: an information list, access restrictions and records of those granted access.
- Contractual chain: rights to employee works (Civil Code Article 1295), contractor deliverables (Article 1296) and component licences should all lead to the company.
- Registration of the program and the database with Rospatent and inclusion in the unified register of Russian software: evidence in a dispute plus tax consequences (IT regime rates).
- A patent — surgically: an algorithm “as such” is not protected, but a technical solution implemented by the system can be an invention; for a startup this is usually more expensive and slower than the secrecy regime.
What depends on it
- Deals: transferring “the model by an acceptance act” without describing the layers (weights, code, dataset, documentation) leaves the buyer a box without a key — see “Deals with AI products”.
- Taxes: a register licence and ordinary services differ in rates — the product's qualification directly changes the economics (the tax regime of an IT company).
- Investments: the investor checks the chain layer by layer — a hole in any of them is a red flag (due diligence of an AI asset).
Matching protection to a specific product and formalising the chain of rights is the task of technology rights practice.
Sources for selected points
This selection concerns only the identified issues and does not constitute a full legal review of the article.