Guiding Case No. 224: [REDACTED]Mei (Tianjin) Image Technology Co., Ltd. v. Henan [REDACTED]Lu Bee Industry Co., Ltd.
(dispute over infringement of the right of communication through information networks)

Keywords: Civil Act, Infringement of the Right of Communication through Information Networks, Ownership, Burden of Proof

Key Points of Judgment

In the event of a dispute over the ownership of copyright, the ownership of copyright cannot be determined solely by watermarks or rights statements. The party claiming copyright shall provide further evidence to substantiate its claim; otherwise, it shall bear adverse legal consequences.

Basic Facts

G[REDACTED] Company (hereinafter referred to as "G Company"), an outsider to the case, authorised [REDACTED]Mei (Tianjin) Image Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "[REDACTED]Mei Image Company") to display, sell and license the use of its brand images within China, and file a lawsuit against infringement. [REDACTED]Mei Image Company found that Henan [REDACTED]Lu Bee Industry Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "[REDACTED]Lu Bee Company") had used four of the said brand images without permission. [REDACTED]Mei Image Company then filed a lawsuit alleging copyright infringement, requesting an order that [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company compensate for economic losses and reasonable expenses for rights protection. To support its claims, [REDACTED]Mei Image Company submitted evidence including the authorisation confirmation letter issued by G Company and website rights statements. The images in question bore the watermark containing the words "Getty Images ®". [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company argued that the upper right corner of the watermark of the images in question was the registered trademark symbol "®", rather than the author's signature which indicates the identity of the creator. The photographer's signature and other brand names under the watermark indicated that the copyright of the images belonged to the author rather than [REDACTED]Mei Image Company or G Company. [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company also inquired of G Company about the ownership of the images in question via email, and received confirmation that the images in question were submitted by photographers and sold under G Company's name; G Company would pay royalties to photographers, while photographers retained the copyright. [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company contended that since the contributors retained the copyright, neither G Company nor [REDACTED]Mei Image Company held the copyright to the images in question, so [REDACTED]Mei Image Company's claims should be dismissed.

Judgment

The Third Intermediate People's Court of Tianjin Municipality issued a civil judgment [(2019) Jin 03 Zhi Min Chu No. 73] on 17 September 2019, ordering [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company to compensate [REDACTED]Mei Image Company for economic losses and reasonable expenses totaling RMB 8,000, while dismissing other claims. [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company appealed against the first-instance judgment. The High People's Court of Tianjin Municipality made a civil judgment [(2020) Jin Min Zhong No. 311] on 16 July 2020, dismissing the appeal and upholding the original judgment. [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company applied to the Supreme People's Court for retrial. The Supreme People's Court ordered a retrial of the case and made a civil judgment [(2021) Zui Gao Fa Min Zai No. 355] on 20 December 2021, overturning the prior judgments and dismissing all claims by [REDACTED]Mei Image Company.

Judgment’s Reasons

The Supreme People's Court held that, in addition to the watermark "Getty Images ®", the images in question also bore the photographers' signature and other brand names, and the registered trademark symbol "®" was immediately followed by "Getty Images". Therefore, the watermark alone could not determine that the copyright of the images in question belonged to G Company. In addition, [REDACTED]Mei Image Company submitted the authorisation confirmation letter issued by G Company and website rights statements, but the letter could only prove that G Company had granted authorisation to [REDACTED]Mei Image Company, not that G Company held the copyright to the images in question. The rights statements were made unilaterally. Copyright ownership cannot be determined solely on their basis without corroboration by other evidence. Under this circumstance, [REDACTED]Mei Image Company should have further borne the burden of proof to prove G Company's ownership of the copyright of the images in question, but it failed to do so. On the contrary, according to some rebuttal evidence such as the reply email of G Company submitted by [REDACTED]Lu Bee Company, G Company confirmed that the photographers of the images still retained the copyright of the images in question. Therefore, [REDACTED]Mei Image Company's claim that G Company owned the copyright of the images in question was not tenable, and its relevant claims in this case should not be upheld.

Relevant Provisions

1. Article 12 of the Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China (Amended in 2020) (The case applied Article 11 of the Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China amended in 2010)

2. Article 7 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Disputes over Copyright (Amended in 2020)

3. Article 90 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on the Application of the Civil Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China (Amended in 2022) (The case applied Article 90 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on the Application of the Civil Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China amended in 2020)