US media company Getty Images largely lost a case it brought against a British AI firm over use of its copyrighted content without permission, a court in London said on Tuesday.
Getty had alleged that London-based Stability AI, whose directors include Canadian filmmaker James Cameron, “extracted millions” of images from Getty’s websites “without consent” to unlawfully train its deep learning AI model, Stable Diffusion.
The model can generate images using verbal commands.
Stability AI rejected the claim, telling a High Court trial which began in June, that the legal action was a “threat” to the business.
Getty, which distributes stock and news photos and videos, including AFP photos, dropped its allegations of breach of copyright during the trial but continued to pursue several other claims, including trade mark infringement and secondary infringement of copyright.
Getty acknowledged that there was “no evidence that the training and development of Stable Diffusion took place in the United Kingdom”, judge Joanna Smith said in a 205-page ruling on Tuesday.
“This court can only determine the issues that arise on the (diminished) case that remains before it,” her ruling said.
Stability AI was found responsible for producing images on which the watermark “Getty” or the subsidiary name “iStock” appeared, a partial win in its trade mark infringement claim.
“In summary, although Getty Images succeed (in part) in their Trade Mark Infringement Claim, my findings are both historic and extremely limited in scope,” Smith also wrote.
The ruling is likely to be seen as a blow for content creators and copyright owners globally at a time of unease over how they can be fairly compensated should AI models use their work.
“We remain deeply concerned that even well-funded companies like Getty Images face significant challenges in protecting their works,” Getty said in a statement.
“We call on governments, including the United Kingdom, to establish stricter transparency rules.”
Christian Dowell, General Counsel for Stability AI, said the company was “pleased” with the court’s ruling.
“Getty’s decision to voluntarily dismiss most of its copyright claims at the conclusion of trial testimony left only a subset of claims before the court, and this final ruling ultimately resolves the copyright concerns that were the core issue,” he said in a statement.
