grey area

plural grey areas · alternative gray area

1. idiomaticAn area intermediate between two mutually exclusive states or categories, where the border between the two is fuzzy or ill-defined.

   It exists in a grey area between legal and illegal.

   Antonyms: bright line, black and white, night and day

2. idiomaticA topic that is not clearly one thing or the other, that is open to interpretation.

   Fame is a grey area[.]

   2007 May, Men's Health, volume 22, number 4, page 94

   2 more examples

   When we employ the MVC architecture, there is often a gray area between the responsibilities of the controller and those of the view, particularly for the kind of software discussed in this case-study.

   2015, Brahma Dathan, Sarnath Ramnath, Object-Oriented Analysis, Design and Implementation: An Integrated Approach, 3rd edition, page 337

   One 'grey area' area of software copyright worth highlighting is the distinction made between so-called literal and non-literal copying. The former term concerns literal copying of underlying computer code or content and should be relatively easy to establish whilst the latter, more contentious area, concerns the extent to which the structure, layout and organisation of the software can be copied without using the computer code or content itself.

   2018, Michala Meiselles, Hugo Wharton, International Licensing Agreements: IP, Technology Transfer and Competition Law

   Synonyms: penumbra