The High Court has now issued its landmark ruling in Getty Image v Stability AI. However, many will still be asking the question – what does this mean for AI developers and rights holders?
Background
On 16 January 2023 Getty Images commenced legal proceedings against Stability AI in the High Court. Getty’s claim included allegations of copyright infringement, trade mark infringement and passing off. In summary, the case surrounded Getty’s claims that Stability AI used Getty’s materials to train its AI model, Stable Diffusion, without the necessary consents. Getty also alleged that the output produced by Stability AI reproduced a substantial part of Getty’s materials. Stability AI denies the claim.
In December 2023 Stability applied for two elements of the claim to be struck out. This was rejected on the basis that due to the complexity of the matter, a full trial was required.
The High Court proceedings finally began on 9 June 2025. Getty’s claim relating to primary copyright infringement was dropped due to its failure to provide sufficient evidence that the acts of unauthorised copying occurred within the UK. This is unfortunate as a decision based on primary infringement would have provided useful guidance to both AI developers and rights holders on whether primary infringement occurs as a result of web scraping and model training.
However, the secondary copyright infringement claim (importing, marketing, selling and distributing), together with the trade mark infringement and passing off claims, proceeded to be determined at trial.
The Decision
The judge found that Getty’s secondary copyright infringement claim failed even though Stability AI accepted that Getty’s materials were used to train Stable Diffusion.
The secondary infringement claim revolved around importing, marketing, selling and distributing an “article” that is an “infringing copy”. Whilst the judge agreed with Getty that an AI model can fall within the definition of an “article”, she did not find that the outputs issued by Stable Diffusion amounted to an infringing copy. The reason being that although Stable Diffusion is altered during training, by the end of the process the AI model does not store the copyright works.
The judge found that Stability AI committed acts of trade mark infringement as some images generated by Stability AI included Getty’s watermark.
Getty has said that it will be taking findings from the UK ruling in a separate claim it has issued in the US.
This significant decision has far reaching implications and will continue to sculpt the future of AI development. Whilst the EU AI Regulations exist, the UK has not yet implemented any legislation governing the development and deployment of AI systems.
Getty has urged the UK government to take steps to protect rights holders and the pressure on the government is mounting.
Get in touch
If you are an AI developer, rights holder or are merely looking to deploy an AI system in your business, please contact Rebecca Anforth (Legal Director) by email at rebecca.anforth@murrellslaw.com.
