PCBWay and your IP

[Cosimo]

Hi All,

Long time lurker, first time poster.  I've noticed many people and companies use PCBWay for fab. I'm a little troubled by Section 11 in their Terms of Service: https://www.pcbway.com/terms_service.html

Ive pasted it below for reference, but my gripe is that I cannot find their legal definition of "User Content".  To me this may mean ANYTHING you post to them.  I'm no law nut, but I was wondering if anyone else here has a better understanding of this?

SECTION 11 - PERSONAL INFORMATION, License AND Publicity
    Your submission of personal information through the PCBWay is governed by our Privacy Policy. The ownership of the file you uploaded remains yours, the design will remain your sole intellectual property.
    License. By providing User Content to PCBWay, You grant PCBWay an irrevocable, non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free, fully paid up, worldwide, transferable and sub-licensable right and license to use, copy, modify, reproduce, distribute and display the data (including 3D CAD Data, 2D technical drawings PCB files, Assembly files and Electronic related documents), documentation, drawings and specifications in Your User Content, and to grant sublicenses of the foregoing rights, solely for the purposes of (1) providing the Site and all information, recommendations and/or services provided to You on or through our Site and (2) to improve our products and services, improving our machine learning and pricing algorithms. You hereby irrevocably waive (and agree to cause to be waived) any claims and assertions of moral rights or attribution with respect to Your User Content.
    Publicity. By creating an account on the Site, You authorize PCBWay to use Your trademarks, logos, names or signs for marketing purposes. This means that PCBWay may mention You as a customer of PCBWay on our Site and in other promotional material such as advertising, press releases, interviews, promotional materials or presentations. We will not use Your name if You are a natural person, and the substantive content provided by You continues to be governed by the confidentiality clauses in these Terms.

[PeteH]

Sounds like you have the understanding right. A bit scary for anyone thinking their designs are somewhat protected.

Reading JLC's, it seems a lot clearer about uploaded data.

https://jlcpcb.com/help/article/Terms-%26-Conditions

[ataradov]

They are limiting those rights to basic necessities to operate the site. The machine learning part may be a bit questionable. The rest is necessary to run the site. When you go into your account they show the visual representation of the ordered PCB. This technically requires a license.

And use logos for the customer list is a common practice. Look at any software product and see them list huge companies that are their customers. 

[newto]

I'd just run on the assumption that any design you have manufactured by anyone in China can be copied. If you're really concerned, have the assembly done locally instead of by them.

But at the end of the day, reverse engineering a PCB is just a matter of time and effort, not difficulty. If someone really wants your designs, they can just buy your product and run the board through a 3d x-ray machine and/or manually map the connections. You can't patent a PCB design, and copyright is easy to get around with minor changes to the design.

[Ice-Tea]

Afaik, "user content" is what is under "shared content" on the site.

[coromonadalix]

better protect all fpga's cpld's, mcu, avr, stm32  ....  codes   

as written  they want to copy  they'll do... minus code  ...