IP risk

Risk in relation to IP comes in two main flavours - either positive (something you did) or negative (something you failed to do).

Positive risk arrives occurs one party infringes the IP of another party. Different forms of IP have different requirements for what consistutes infringement, defences against infringement, and the remedies availiable to deal with infringement. These requirements, defences and remedies may also differ in different countries and jurisdictions. 

Currently, there is a lot of discussion about the risk of infringement when using Artificial Intelligence products and services, as these are usually trained on masses of material taken from online and offline sources, including copyrighted material owned by others. Another aspect of this sort of risk is liability, meaning who the risk applies to. For instance, the contracts for using many online services may include a limitation of liablity clause which is intended to prevent the risk of IP infringement from attaching to the company providing the service.

Negative risk arises from failing to properly obtain or manage IP in the first place. This may take many forms, from cases where value is not captured (such as failing to patent an invention that then becomes common in industry), to cases where IP is inadvertantly given to another party (such as when an outside contractor creates copyrightable works for a person or business without proper assignment mechanisms being in place).