A permission to file a patent application outside the home country (usually the country of basic application) obtained from the Patent Office of that country is commonly referred to as the Foreign Filing Permit. The purported objective behind such check, perhaps, is to prevent the defense related inventions from being escaped to other jurisdictions without the State of origin being given first choice to use it.

Should it be desired to file an application in a country other than an inventor’s country of residence, it may be necessary to obtain a foreign filing license from the inventor’s national patent office to permit filing abroad. Some offices, such as the USPTO, may grant an automatic license after a specified time (e.g., 6 months), if a secrecy order is not issued in that time.