---
id: KB-LE-012
url: https://app.codecontract.io/help/legal/intellectual-property-proving-it-was-yours
idioma: en
categoria: sector-legal
subcategoria: propiedad
audiencia: usuario
nivel: avanzado
actualizado: 2026-08-13
tambienEn: [es]
relacionados: [KB-SC-011, KB-LE-008]
citadoPor: [KB-LE-004]
---

# Intellectual property: proving it was yours

_Registering is one thing and proving it existed earlier is another. You usually need both._

**Responde a:** how to prove an idea is mine · proving the creation date of a design · protecting a development without registering it · trade secret documentation

In a dispute over who created what, the argument is rarely about the content: it is about **when** it existed and in whose hands. And that part is not solved by registration, it is solved by what you kept while working.

## The three layers, and what each is for

| Layer | What it gives | What it does NOT give |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Formal registration (trade mark, design, patent) | A right enforceable against third parties | It does not prove what you did before registering |
| Contracts with whoever created it | That the rights are yours and not the maker's | It does not prove the creation date |
| Evidence with a provable date | That the content existed on that date and has not changed | It does not prove you were the creator |

> [!IMPORTANT]
> The third column of the last row is worth understanding before relying on it. Sealing a file proves **date and non-alteration**, not authorship: it says the document existed in that form on day X and was in your possession, not that you made it. That is a great deal in a priority dispute and insufficient when the argument is about who created it — for that you have contracts and the trail of the work.

## What to keep while working

1. **Intermediate versions, not only the final one** — A draft with its corrections proves a process; the final result proves only a result.
2. **Who did each part and when** — Especially where freelancers, agencies or interns were involved.
3. **Contracts with everyone involved, signed before starting** — An assignment signed afterwards works worse and sometimes does not work.
4. **And what you showed third parties, with dates** — Before a trade fair, a client meeting or a demo, seal what you are about to show.

> [!WARNING]
> Point three prevents the most grief in small companies. If an outside agency designed your brand or a freelancer wrote part of the code, the rights are not automatically yours because you paid the invoice: they depend on what the contract says. And that conversation is easy before starting and awkward three years later.

## Trade secrets follow a different route

**En corto**

- They are not registered: they are protected by keeping them secret and being able to show it.
- That means signed confidentiality agreements and access that is limited and logged.
- If everyone in the company can see it and nobody signed anything, it stops being a protectable secret.

Here the record of who accessed what stops being a convenience and becomes part of the protection: it is how you show you treated that information as confidential.

> [!NOTE]
> What can be registered, where, and with what effect varies by type of creation and by territory, and a trade mark is not the same as a design or a piece of software. **What you should register and with what scope is a question for your lawyer**; what is described here is what to keep so that conversation starts with material rather than recollections.

**Does sealing a file replace registration?**

No. They are different and complementary: one gives a right, the other gives a date.

**What if the dispute is with a former employee?**

There the contract, what they signed and the record of what they accessed all weigh.

**Is emailing it to yourself any use?**

Better than nothing and rather weak: the date depends on a mailbox you control.

## Ejemplos

**A company finds a competitor launching something very like its own development.**

- Retrieves the sealed intermediate versions and the contracts of everyone involved

→ It can establish when it existed and that the rights are its own, instead of arguing from memory.

**The file's modified date is relied upon.**

- Timestamps the work when it is finished

→ The date does not depend on the computer.

**A design is shown to a client with no prior record.**

- Timestamps before showing it

→ Priority in time is provable.

**Similar work appears months later.**

- Checks the timestamp of the original version

→ The date does not rest on your word.

**The work evolves through several versions.**

- Timestamps each relevant version

→ Each step can be placed in time.

**It must be proved without revealing the content.**

- Shares only the fingerprint

→ The proof travels without the work.