What are landmark cases that shaped legal standards for digital image possession?
Executive summary
Landmark cases in 2024–2025 have redefined how courts treat digital image possession and related copyright claims: the UK High Court rejected a blanket rule that secondary infringement requires a tangible “article,” finding intangible assets can be treated as articles for possession under the CDPA in Getty Images v. Stability AI (judge’s ruling described by Hogan Lovells and Gowling WLG) [1] [2]. U.S. and EU litigation over AI training and digital copies — Anthropic, Stability AI, Getty, GEMA v. OpenAI and pending Supreme Court attention in Cox Communications — show courts are splitting on liability theories and remedies for digital copying and possession [3] [4] [2] [5] [6].
1. How UK law treated “possession” of digital copies — a doctrinal pivot
The UK High Court in Getty Images v. Stability AI clarified that secondary-infringement concepts like “importing” or “possessing” an infringing copy under sections 22–23 of the CDPA can apply to intangible items; the trial judge rejected Stability’s argument limiting “articles” to tangible objects and allowed rightsholders a route to pursue claims tied to model weights and copies used in training [2] [1]. Travers Smith and Gowling WLG describe this as a limited win for rightsholders because Getty dropped primary infringement claims and the ruling’s scope depends on factual proof of where training occurred [7] [2].
2. U.S. litigation shows fractured rules for AI training and digital possession
Federal court rulings involving Anthropic and other AI defendants have produced mixed outcomes: a judge dismissed some claims but ordered a trial on allegations of using pirated digital copies, and coverage highlights that judges are carving narrow pathways — favorable to some AI defendants on particular legal theories but leaving liability on possession or theft for trial [3] [4]. Kirkland & Ellis and other commentators list multiple pending U.S. copyright cases to watch in 2025 that test how courts treat bulk digital copying and downstream possession or use [8].
3. International ripple effects — Germany and beyond
German and other continental decisions also influence the landscape: the Munich Regional Court largely sided with GEMA against OpenAI on injunctive relief and damages tied to music-rights uses in training, signaling courts will entertain strong remedies where rightsholders show harm from unauthorized digital use [5]. These cross‑jurisdictional rulings create a mosaic rather than a uniform international standard, pressuring platforms and AI developers to navigate multiple, divergent tests for “possession” and liability [5].
4. What “possession” means in practice — intangible vs. tangible
Legal teams and courts are wrestling with whether model weights, cached copies, or cloud‑hosted files amount to “copies” that can be possessed, imported, or dealt with under copyright statutes. The Hogan Lovells analysis of the Getty decision notes the court’s confirmation that infringing “articles” need not be tangible, a development that is especially consequential for cloud‑based distribution and AI training where no physical medium changes hands [1]. That interpretation expands plaintiffs’ toolkit but leaves open questions about proof and jurisdiction [1] [2].
5. Competing policy and industry perspectives
Rightsholders portray these rulings as necessary to prevent large-scale, unauthorized reuse of creative inventories; AI and platform defenders argue narrow rulings preserve innovation and recognize practical differences between ephemeral model artifacts and classical physical copies. Coverage of the Anthropic decisions and related reporting shows courts sometimes favor defendants on narrow issues (e.g., fair use or authorship limits) while preserving trials on allegations of piracy and possession [4] [3].
6. Limits of current reporting and what’s unresolved
Available sources do not mention a single, settled global standard defining when intangible model artifacts equal “possession” across all jurisdictions; the terrain remains case‑specific and fact‑bound (not found in current reporting). Several reports stress that outcomes often hinge on where training occurred, what copies were retained, and the factual record about acquisition and storage [7] [2].
7. Practical takeaways for lawyers, platforms and creators
Practitioners should assume that courts may treat digital copies and model artifacts as actionable “articles” in some jurisdictions (per the UK High Court) and that U.S. courts are litigating both narrow defenses and open theft claims that can go to trial [1] [4]. Companies should document sources, purchases, and internals of model training and storage because judges are scrutinizing acquisition and possession facts when deciding liability and remedies [3] [4].
Limitations: this overview relies on recent case reporting and law‑firm analyses in the supplied sources; it does not purport to catalogue older precedents (e.g., admissibility of altered digital photos or First Amendment deepfake rulings) beyond what these sources include (available sources do not mention earlier U.S. landmark photo‑evidence cases in detail) [9] [10].