AgentCounsel

Infringement Triage

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/SKILL.md

Agent Trigger Description

Use when a client needs a first-pass, structured triage of a potential intellectual property infringement issue — identifying the key factors, flagging their direction, and routing to IP counsel — without concluding whether infringement occurred.

What this produces: Infringement triage memo identifying key factors and routing to IP counsel

What you give it: IP rights at issue; The parties' posture and relationship; The available evidence of potential infringement

When to use it: A client believes its trademark, copyright, patent, or trade secret may be infringed and needs structured intake before enforcement counsel acts.

At a glance

Practice areaIntellectual Property
Categorytriage
Risk levelmedium
Recommended quality checksattorney-review-gate assumption-audit citation-integrity-check source-validation-check jurisdiction-deadline-gates privilege-confidentiality-check output-format-compliance-check
Eval coverageManual eval ready
Compatible platformschatgpt, claude, cursor, codex, gemini, generic-md
Related skillscease and desist response, fto triage, trademark clearance triage, dmca takedown, demand letter

Example output not yet available.

Selective execution package

This skill has a typed execution contract at skills/ip/infringement-triage/SPEC.json. Its compact core is suitable for routing and quick triage. Standard or deep execution also needs the resources selected by the contract.

Selection rule: choose a declared mode and evaluate each module's machine-readable activation object exactly. Missing activation inputs fail closed. Do not load every conditional module merely because an input is absent.

Declared modes: See the compiled contract

Budget scenarios: 6

Portable copy: “Copy Full Package” includes every possible resource, so it is complete but not context-minimal. Use MCP get_skill_context for the exact selected bundle.

ModuleKindActivationCanonical path
factor-method workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; always within an allowed mode. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/factor-method.md
trademark workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; when ip-rights-at-issue contains any of: trademark. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trademark.md
copyright workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; when ip-rights-at-issue contains any of: copyright. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/copyright.md
patent workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; when ip-rights-at-issue contains any of: patent. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/patent.md
trade-secret workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; when ip-rights-at-issue contains any of: trade-secret. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trade-secret.md
defenses-routing-output workflow-module Modes: standard, deep-review; always within an allowed mode. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/defenses-routing-output.md
expanded-verification quality-check Modes: deep-review; always within an allowed mode. skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/expanded-verification.md
Typed contract: SPEC.json 
{
  "schema_version": "2.0",
  "skill_id": "ip/infringement-triage",
  "input_schema": [
    {
      "id": "ip-rights-at-issue",
      "label": "IP rights at issue",
      "type": "string-list",
      "required": true,
      "description": "One or more controlled identifiers for the intellectual-property rights requiring separate analysis.",
      "source_requirement": "user-provided-and-confirmed",
      "may_infer": false,
      "sensitive": false,
      "items": [
        "trademark",
        "copyright",
        "patent",
        "trade-secret"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "modules": [
    {
      "id": "factor-method",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/factor-method.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "standard or deep-review mode",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "operator": "always"
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "trademark",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trademark.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "the confirmed right list includes trademark",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "input_id": "ip-rights-at-issue",
        "operator": "contains-any",
        "values": [
          "trademark"
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "copyright",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/copyright.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "the confirmed right list includes copyright",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "input_id": "ip-rights-at-issue",
        "operator": "contains-any",
        "values": [
          "copyright"
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "patent",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/patent.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "the confirmed right list includes patent",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "input_id": "ip-rights-at-issue",
        "operator": "contains-any",
        "values": [
          "patent"
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "trade-secret",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trade-secret.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "the confirmed right list includes trade-secret",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "input_id": "ip-rights-at-issue",
        "operator": "contains-any",
        "values": [
          "trade-secret"
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "defenses-routing-output",
      "kind": "workflow-module",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/defenses-routing-output.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "standard or deep-review mode",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "standard",
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "operator": "always"
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "expanded-verification",
      "kind": "quality-check",
      "path": "skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/expanded-verification.md",
      "required": false,
      "load_when": "deep-review mode",
      "activation": {
        "modes": [
          "deep-review"
        ],
        "operator": "always"
      }
    }
  ],
  "context_scenarios": [
    {
      "id": "quick-triage",
      "mode": "quick-triage",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "trademark"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 0.4
    },
    {
      "id": "standard-trademark",
      "mode": "standard",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "trademark"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 0.7
    },
    {
      "id": "standard-copyright",
      "mode": "standard",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "copyright"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 0.7
    },
    {
      "id": "standard-patent",
      "mode": "standard",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "patent"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 0.7
    },
    {
      "id": "standard-trade-secret",
      "mode": "standard",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "trade-secret"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 0.7
    },
    {
      "id": "deep-all-rights",
      "mode": "deep-review",
      "inputs": {
        "ip-rights-at-issue": [
          "trademark",
          "copyright",
          "patent",
          "trade-secret"
        ],
        "parties-posture-and-relationship": "accused party",
        "available-evidence-of-potential-infringement": "Provided comparison evidence"
      },
      "baseline_estimated_tokens": 6115,
      "max_ratio": 1.15
    }
  ]
}
Module: factor-method

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/factor-method.md

Common Factor Method

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Use this module in standard and deep-review modes before any right-specific module.

For every selected IP right:

  1. State the candidate factor or threshold question without naming an unverified jurisdiction-specific test.
  2. Identify only the disclosed facts relevant to that factor and attribute each fact to its source.
  3. Assign one direction: favors the senior party, favors the accused party, mixed, or insufficient information to assess.
  4. Explain the direction in one or two sentences without converting it into a legal conclusion.
  5. Mark the legal test, factor weight, and any close call [verify jurisdiction].
  6. Record the additional fact, document, registry verification, technical comparison, or expert input needed to resolve uncertainty.
  7. Analyze each right separately. Never blend trademark, copyright, patent, and trade-secret frameworks into a single merits score.

When facts conflict, preserve both versions and identify the conflict. When the record is incomplete, default to insufficient information to assess; do not manufacture a direction.

Module: trademark

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trademark.md

Trademark Factors

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Apply this module only when trademark is selected. Confirm the controlling jurisdiction-specific framework before reliance.

  • Ownership and validity: supplied registration or common-law claim, use, priority, ownership chain, mark form, goods or services, and apparent strength. Treat registration and validity as [VERIFY: current status and validity]; do not classify the mark conclusively.
  • Potential confusion: compare appearance, sound, meaning, goods or services, trade channels, purchasers and purchase conditions, actual-confusion evidence, selection circumstances, and apparent commercial strength. The controlling factors and their weight are [verify jurisdiction].
  • Trade dress or source-identifying features: identify the claimed features with specificity; flag functionality, distinctiveness, and non-functionality questions for counsel.
  • Dilution: surface only when fame is expressly asserted or supported by supplied facts. Mark fame, blurring, tarnishment, and exclusions [ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM].
  • False association, passing off, false advertising, or unfair competition: keep each candidate theory separate from confusion analysis and route it for counsel confirmation.
  • Priority and geographic scope: record supplied first-use facts, territories, channels, and concurrent-use issues without determining priority.
Module: copyright

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/copyright.md

Copyright Factors

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Apply this module only when copyright is selected. Confirm the controlling jurisdiction-specific framework before reliance.

  • Ownership and chain of title: identify the creator, joint-authorship, work-made-for-hire, assignment, license, and termination questions visible from supplied material. Mark the chain [VERIFY].
  • Registration: record only supplied registration identifiers and dates. Treat current status and any remedial significance as [VERIFY: registration date and status] [verify jurisdiction].
  • Access and copying: organize supplied access evidence, similarities, differences, chronology, and independent-creation evidence. Do not infer access or copying from similarity alone.
  • Protectable expression: separate candidate expression from ideas, facts, systems, functional material, merger, scènes à faire, public-domain content, and other potentially unprotectable material. Counsel must confirm the applicable doctrines.
  • Substantial similarity: describe the comparison without deciding the governing test or outcome.
  • Fair use and analogous defenses: identify facially relevant purpose, nature, amount, and market facts, but do not decide fair use.
  • Platform or intermediary issues: flag safe-harbor, notice, knowledge, repeat-infringer, and host-liability questions only as counsel-review items.
Module: patent

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/patent.md

Patent Factors

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Apply this module only when patent is selected. Keep accused-party work within counsel-directed privileged channels.

  • Identify the supplied patent and asserted claims. If claim numbers or complete claim language are absent, state that no claim-by-claim comparison can be performed.
  • Compare each supplied claim element to the accused product or method using only supplied claim text and technical facts. Mark each element present, absent, or uncertain with its supporting source.
  • This is a preliminary read only, not formal claim construction. Counsel must supervise claim construction and any infringement opinion.
  • Flag doctrine-of-equivalents questions for elements marked absent or uncertain without deciding equivalence.
  • Flag inducement, contributory infringement, divided infringement, territoriality, and other indirect or threshold theories only when visible from supplied facts. [ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM]
  • Identify candidate invalidity and enforceability issues, including supplied prior-art, written-description, enablement, obviousness, eligibility, inequitable-conduct, misuse, exhaustion, license, and prior-user facts, but do not assess validity.
  • For an accused party, flag knowledge, notice, response, preservation, opinion-of-counsel, and willfulness implications for immediate counsel direction. Do not circulate the analysis outside approved privileged channels.
Module: trade-secret

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/trade-secret.md

Trade-Secret Factors

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Apply this module only when trade-secret is selected. Confirm the governing statute, common law, and conflict rules before reliance.

  • Identification: require the alleged secret to be described with enough specificity for factual comparison. Otherwise use [CONFIRM: specific identification of claimed trade secret].
  • Secrecy: organize supplied disclosure, publication, accessibility, reverse-engineering, prior-art, and shared-recipient facts without deciding secrecy.
  • Reasonable measures: identify access controls, confidentiality terms, training, labeling, technical security, physical security, monitoring, exit procedures, and enforcement practices actually supported by the record.
  • Acquisition or use: organize facts concerning improper means, authorization, confidentiality duties, use, disclosure, knowledge, and benefit. Do not decide misappropriation.
  • Ownership and entitlement: flag employee, contractor, joint-development, assignment, license, and provenance questions.
  • Independent development or reverse engineering: preserve the accused party's development history, source materials, repositories, witnesses, and chronology; treat the defense as [ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM].
  • Preservation and containment: identify at-risk evidence, ongoing access, return or deletion issues, and immediate counsel-directed preservation needs without directing self-help or evidence destruction.
Module: defenses-routing-output

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/defenses-routing-output.md

Defenses, Routing Signal, and Output

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Use this module after the common factor method and all selected right-specific modules.

Defenses and thresholds

For each right, list visible defenses and threshold questions without deciding them. Consider validity and enforceability, ownership and standing, license or consent, limitations or laches, exhaustion or first sale, fair use or analogous equitable defenses, prior use, independent development, functionality, safe harbor, misuse, inequitable conduct, territoriality, and any additional issue supported by disclosed facts. Mark jurisdiction and timing questions [verify jurisdiction] [deadline verification required].

Routing signal

Assign one signal based only on the disclosed facts:

  • RED: one or more central factors present materially elevated claim or defense risk and prompt IP-counsel engagement is warranted.
  • YELLOW: material factors conflict, key evidence is missing, or more than one plausible outcome remains.
  • GREEN: the disclosed facts facially provide weak support for the asserted theory or comparatively strong support for the accused position, but counsel review remains required.

Identify the one or two facts most responsible for the signal and state:

This signal is a routing indicator based solely on disclosed facts. It is not a finding that infringement has or has not occurred. Counsel must verify the right, apply controlling law, evaluate defenses, and determine strategy.

What-cuts-which-way table

For each right, produce: Factor | Direction | Key Disclosed Fact | Source | Verification Needed. End every table with: This is a preliminary organizational tool, not a finding of infringement or non-infringement.

Posture-specific next steps

For a potential senior party, frame counsel-review options concerning validity and ownership verification, evidence preservation, technical or marketplace investigation, enforcement posture, informal outreach, demand, takedown, licensing, and litigation. Do not recommend action as final.

For an accused party, prioritize counsel engagement, privilege, evidence preservation, independent-development and prior-use proof, technical comparison, defenses, insurance notice, response posture, and avoidance of unsupported admissions. Mark every supplied response date [deadline verification required].

For either posture, state that registry, docket, legal-research, technical-expert, and merits work remain outside this triage bundle.

Assemble the memo

Use templates/infringement-triage-memo.md with sections for scope and posture, per-right factor analysis, defenses, routing signal, summary table, posture-specific next steps, assumptions and missing information, and attorney verification. Attribute facts and state the impact of each missing input.

Module: expanded-verification

Canonical path: skills/ip/infringement-triage/modules/expanded-verification.md

Expanded IP Verification

Draft legal work product for attorney review. This module inherits every safety rule and gate in the parent skill.

Use this module only in deep-review mode. Add the applicable checks to the parent checklist.

  • [ ] Each implicated IP right was separately identified and no plausible overlapping right or non-IP theory was silently omitted.
  • [ ] Party posture, standing, ownership, chain of title, license status, and governing law were confirmed.
  • [ ] Current registration, filing, maintenance, renewal, cancellation, opposition, reexamination, review, and docket status were independently checked in authoritative sources.
  • [ ] The complete jurisdiction-specific factor framework and weighting were supplied or confirmed by counsel for each right.
  • [ ] Trademark: priority, scope, strength, confusion, trade dress, dilution, functionality, geographic limits, and related theories were separately evaluated where applicable.
  • [ ] Copyright: authorship, chain of title, registration, protectable expression, access, copying, similarity, fair use, and intermediary issues were evaluated by counsel.
  • [ ] Patent: asserted claims were confirmed; formal claim construction and a counsel-supervised element analysis superseded this triage; validity, indirect theories, willfulness, privilege, and territorial issues were assessed.
  • [ ] Trade secret: the alleged secret was identified with particularity; secrecy, reasonable measures, acquisition, use, disclosure, ownership, and independent development were evaluated.
  • [ ] Every candidate defense and threshold issue was analyzed under controlling law, including any defense not surfaced by the first-pass facts.
  • [ ] Every factual statement, technical comparison, market assertion, date, identifier, quotation, and paraphrase was checked against its supplied source.
  • [ ] Any required technical, survey, damages, source-code, forensic, registry, or other expert work was identified and performed outside this triage workflow.
  • [ ] Limitations, laches, notice, preservation, response, filing, and other timing issues were independently assessed; no date was calculated from this memo. [deadline verification required]
  • [ ] A legal hold was considered and relevant physical, electronic, marketplace, development, communication, and access evidence was preserved.
  • [ ] Insurance, indemnity, platform, contractual, employment, confidentiality, and regulatory interfaces were considered where supported by the facts.
  • [ ] Privilege, work product, confidentiality, protective-order, redaction, and distribution controls were confirmed.
  • [ ] The routing signal was reconsidered after resolving missing facts and was not converted into a merits opinion or outcome prediction.
  • [ ] All assumptions, gaps, placeholders, and conflicting facts were resolved or explicitly accepted by counsel.
  • [ ] IP counsel reviewed and approved every next step before enforcement, response, cessation, disclosure, or commercial action.

Purpose

Produce a structured first-pass triage memo for a potential intellectual-property dispute. The workflow identifies the rights implicated, organizes the disclosed facts under the applicable factor categories, records which direction each factor appears to point, assigns a routing signal, and frames next steps for either a potential senior party or an accused party.

This is draft legal work product for attorney review. It is not a legal opinion on whether infringement occurred, a merits determination, a freedom-to-operate opinion, formal claim construction, or legal advice. Only counsel may determine validity, infringement, defenses, and strategy.

Use When

Required Inputs

If a required input is absent, stop and ask or state exactly which part of the analysis remains incomplete. Never fabricate ownership, registration, priority, claim language, facts, or dates.

Do Not Use When

Workflow

  1. Confirm rights, posture, jurisdiction, facts, evidence, supplied status information, and dates. Stop for ambiguous posture or rights.
  2. Analyze each selected right separately. Do not blend legal frameworks or allow strength under one right to substitute for another.
  3. Select the execution mode:
    • quick-triage: use this core only to confirm scope, posture, missing inputs, immediate privilege or preservation concerns, and the right-specific modules required;
    • standard: load modules/factor-method.md, each selected right module, and modules/defenses-routing-output.md;
    • deep-review: load all standard modules plus modules/expanded-verification.md.
  4. For each selected right, record each factor, disclosed facts, apparent direction, missing facts, and jurisdiction-verification need. Do not resolve close calls.
  5. Identify defenses without deciding them; assign a routing signal; frame posture-specific next steps; list assumptions and missing information.

Output Format

Label the result:

DRAFT - INFRINGEMENT TRIAGE MEMO Attorney review is required before any enforcement action, demand, response, or change in conduct. This memo does not conclude whether infringement occurred.

Return only the detail supported by the selected mode. Standard and deep-review outputs use templates/infringement-triage-memo.md and contain:

  1. Scope and Posture
  2. Factor Analysis by Right
  3. Defenses and Threshold Questions
  4. Triage Signal, with the no-conclusion caveat
  5. What Cuts Which Way Summary
  6. Recommended Next Steps
  7. Assumptions and Missing Information
  8. Attorney Verification Items

Use [CONFIRM: ...], [VERIFY: ...], [ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM: ...], [citation needed], [verify jurisdiction], and [deadline verification required] wherever the source or conclusion is not confirmed.

Attorney Verification Checklist

Core raw SKILL.md

---
name: Infringement Triage
description: "Use when a client needs a first-pass, structured triage of a potential intellectual property infringement issue — identifying the key factors, flagging their direction, and routing to IP counsel — without concluding whether infringement occurred."
practice_area: ip
task_type: triage
jurisdictions: []
risk_level: medium
requires_attorney_review: true
inputs:
  - "IP rights at issue"
  - "The parties' posture and relationship"
  - "The available evidence of potential infringement"
outputs:
  - "Infringement triage memo identifying key factors and routing to IP counsel"
related_skills:
  - skills/ip/cease-and-desist-response/SKILL.md
  - skills/ip/fto-triage/SKILL.md
  - skills/ip/trademark-clearance-triage/SKILL.md
  - skills/ip/dmca-takedown/SKILL.md
  - skills/litigation/demand-letter/SKILL.md
tags:
  - ip
  - infringement
  - triage
  - ip-enforcement
  - routing
---

# Infringement Triage

## Purpose

Produce a structured first-pass triage memo for a potential intellectual-property dispute. The workflow identifies the rights implicated, organizes the disclosed facts under the applicable factor categories, records which direction each factor appears to point, assigns a routing signal, and frames next steps for either a potential senior party or an accused party.

This is draft legal work product for attorney review. It is not a legal opinion on whether infringement occurred, a merits determination, a freedom-to-operate opinion, formal claim construction, or legal advice. Only counsel may determine validity, infringement, defenses, and strategy.

## Use When

- A client believes its trademark, copyright, patent, or trade secret may be infringed and needs structured intake before enforcement counsel acts.
- A client may be accused of infringement and needs a privileged first-pass organization of facts and issues.
- The user needs a briefing memo for IP counsel rather than a definitive conclusion.
- More than one IP right may apply and each needs a separate, inspectable analysis.

## Required Inputs

- **IP rights at issue.** One or more of `trademark`, `copyright`, `patent`, or `trade-secret`. Do not infer a right from ambiguous facts; request confirmation.
- **Party posture.** Confirm whether the client is the potential senior party or accused party. Stop if unclear because routing recommendations differ.
- **Jurisdiction or governing law.** If missing, use `[CONFIRM: governing law and jurisdiction]`; factor frameworks applied in this memo must be confirmed `[verify jurisdiction]`.
- **Relevant facts and evidence.** The asserted right, accused material or conduct, available comparison evidence, ownership facts, and source attribution.
- **Known identifiers and status information.** Registration, filing, claim, or application details only as supplied. This workflow does not perform a registry or docket search; every status remains `[VERIFY: current status]`.
- **Timing information.** Record supplied conduct, priority, creation, complaint, or demand dates. No clock is computed, and every timing issue is marked `[deadline verification required]`.
- Optional: the client's enforcement posture, risk tolerance, and preservation or insurance context.

If a required input is absent, stop and ask or state exactly which part of the analysis remains incomplete. Never fabricate ownership, registration, priority, claim language, facts, or dates.

## Do Not Use When

- Responding to a formal cease-and-desist letter. Use `cease-and-desist-response`.
- Conducting patent freedom-to-operate work. Use `fto-triage`.
- Clearing a proposed mark before use. Use `trademark-clearance-triage`.
- Preparing or evaluating a DMCA notice. Use `dmca-takedown`.
- Drafting an outbound demand. Use `demand-letter`.
- The user requests a definitive infringement, validity, enforceability, or outcome conclusion.
- The issue is exclusively non-domestic and no supported legal framework has been supplied. `[ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM]`

## Legal Safety Rules

- The output is draft legal work product for attorney review. Do not enforce, stop conduct, answer a demand, or make a commercial commitment based solely on it.
- This workflow produces a **routing signal, not an infringement finding**. GREEN, YELLOW, and RED communicate review urgency and fact posture only; they are not merits findings or outcome predictions.
- Counsel determines the controlling right, validity, legal test, element weighting, infringement, available relief, and strategy. Every jurisdiction-specific framework remains `[verify jurisdiction]`.
- For an accused-party patent matter, preserve privilege and confidentiality because awareness and analysis may affect a later willfulness inquiry. `[ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM]`
- Do not run or claim to run a registry, register, docket, or database search. Treat all ownership, registration, filing, maintenance, cancellation, reexamination, and status information as unverified.
- Follow `core/source-and-citation-discipline.md`. Never invent authority, named tests, statutes, cases, quotations, deadlines, registration facts, or claim language.
- Apply the two-way-door rule: surface every plausible right, factor, defense, timing issue, and preservation concern; counsel may narrow later.
- Do not decide any affirmative defense. Identify it as an issue for counsel and use `[ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM]`.
- Separate disclosed facts, analytical observations, assumptions, and verification items.
- Flag uncertainty visibly instead of silently resolving it.
- Preserve client confidentiality, privilege, and work-product restrictions.

## Workflow

1. Confirm rights, posture, jurisdiction, facts, evidence, supplied status information, and dates. Stop for ambiguous posture or rights.
2. Analyze each selected right separately. Do not blend legal frameworks or allow strength under one right to substitute for another.
3. Select the execution mode:
   - **quick-triage:** use this core only to confirm scope, posture, missing inputs, immediate privilege or preservation concerns, and the right-specific modules required;
   - **standard:** load `modules/factor-method.md`, each selected right module, and `modules/defenses-routing-output.md`;
   - **deep-review:** load all standard modules plus `modules/expanded-verification.md`.
4. For each selected right, record each factor, disclosed facts, apparent direction, missing facts, and jurisdiction-verification need. Do not resolve close calls.
5. Identify defenses without deciding them; assign a routing signal; frame posture-specific next steps; list assumptions and missing information.

## Output Format

Label the result:

> **DRAFT - INFRINGEMENT TRIAGE MEMO**
> Attorney review is required before any enforcement action, demand, response, or change in conduct. This memo does not conclude whether infringement occurred.

Return only the detail supported by the selected mode. Standard and deep-review outputs use `templates/infringement-triage-memo.md` and contain:

1. **Scope and Posture**
2. **Factor Analysis by Right**
3. **Defenses and Threshold Questions**
4. **Triage Signal**, with the no-conclusion caveat
5. **What Cuts Which Way Summary**
6. **Recommended Next Steps**
7. **Assumptions and Missing Information**
8. **Attorney Verification Items**

Use `[CONFIRM: ...]`, `[VERIFY: ...]`, `[ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM: ...]`, `[citation needed]`, `[verify jurisdiction]`, and `[deadline verification required]` wherever the source or conclusion is not confirmed.

## Attorney Verification Checklist

- [ ] The rights and party posture are complete and accurate; no plausible additional right was missed.
- [ ] Governing law and the controlling factor framework for each right are confirmed.
- [ ] Ownership, registration or filing status, chain of title, maintenance, and enforceability were independently verified.
- [ ] Every fact, comparison, identifier, date, and quoted or paraphrased source was checked against supplied material.
- [ ] Every defense and timing-sensitive doctrine was evaluated by counsel; no deadline was derived from this memo.
- [ ] The triage signal is treated only as routing information, not a legal opinion or prediction.
- [ ] Preservation, legal-hold, privilege, confidentiality, insurance, and response issues were considered.
- [ ] Recommended next steps were tailored and approved by IP counsel before action.
- [ ] All assumptions, gaps, and placeholders were resolved before the memo was relied upon or shared with the client.