How Could Copyright Law Limit My Ability To Legally Reverse Engineer?
Reverse engineers execute code and/or make copies of software as part of analyzing the way the program works. Copyright law generally grants a certain set of exclusive rights to copyright owners, including the right to make copies of copyrighted works. Software is one category of works that are protected by copyright. As a result, if you make copies of software, you generally need either permission from the copyright owner, or your copying must fall within an exception granted by the copyright laws. Permission can be inferred from the outright sale of a copy of software or from a license agreement. The copyright exception most relevant to reverse engineering is the fair use doctrine. Executing code also raises the possibility of copyright issues. Some courts have stated that causing code to be copied from disk into RAM may be a copy for purposes of copyright law, and if that RAM copy is unlicensed, then it is infringing. In other words, executing unlicensed code could be infringing. Fu
