Getty drops key copyright claims against Stability AI, but UK lawsuit continues

In a significant turn of events, Getty Images has withdrawn its main copyright infringement claims against Stability AI at London's High Court. This decision narrows one of the most closely watched legal disputes concerning the use of copyrighted material for training artificial intelligence models. However, the case is far from over, as Getty continues to pursue other claims and a separate lawsuit in the United States. This development follows a ruling in the U.S. where a judge favored Anthropic in a similar case regarding the legality of training AI on books without the authors' consent. Getty Images initially filed its lawsuit against Stability AI, the creator of the AI image generator Stable Diffusion, in January 2023. The company accused Stability of utilizing millions of copyrighted images for AI training without authorization. Additionally, Getty maintained that the outputs generated by Stable Diffusion bore similarities to the copyrighted works they were trained on, with some even containing Getty's watermarks. As of Wednesday, these specific claims have been dropped, as Getty's legal team cited insufficient evidence and a lack of knowledgeable witnesses from Stability AI. Ben Maling, a partner at the law firm EIP, noted that the withdrawal likely stems from difficulties in proving a sufficient connection to UK copyright jurisdiction. Getty's legal strategy now focuses on stronger allegations, including a secondary infringement claim and trademark infringement. The secondary infringement argument posits that the AI models themselves could infringe copyright laws, suggesting that their use in the UK might amount to importing infringing articles, even if the training occurred elsewhere. Stability AI expressed satisfaction with Getty's decision to retract multiple claims, asserting confidence that the remaining trademark allegations will not hold, as consumers do not interpret watermarks as commercial endorsements from Stability AI. In addition to the UK lawsuits, Getty's U.S. division filed its own case against Stability AI in February, claiming that Stability used around 12 million copyrighted images for AI training without permission and seeking a staggering $1.7 billion in damages. Furthermore, Stability AI is also facing a lawsuit alongside Midjourney and DeviantArt after a collective of visual artists accused the three companies of copyright infringement. Interestingly, Getty Images has developed its own generative AI tool that utilizes models trained on its iStock photography and video libraries, allowing users to create new, licensable images and artwork.