This case originates from a real civil copyright judgment of an intermediate people’s court in eastern China. All enterprise names are anonymized to comply with requirements. The plaintiff entity, Star Media Co., Ltd, held the exclusive right of communication through information network for a popular documentary audiovisual work. The defendant is Cloud Short‑Video Co., Ltd, an operator of a mainstream domestic short‑video social platform. This lawsuit focuses on platform indirect copyright infringement obligation, identification of safe‑harbour rule application boundary, and judicial judgment on massive user‑uploaded clip‑splitting infringing content under China’s Copyright Law of 2021中国法院网.
Star Media completed the production and copyright registration of the documentary series. It signed an exclusive licensing contract and obtained full online broadcasting rights including the right of communication through information network. The documentary accumulated high public attention after official release. A large number of ordinary platform users logged into Cloud Short‑Video’s application, downloaded original documentary episodes, split complete episodes into hundreds of short edited clips, and uploaded these segmented video excerpts to public accounts on Cloud Short‑Video platform. These uploaded clips covered core plots, key interview segments and major narrative content of the original documentary. Many infringing short‑videos gained millions of cumulative views, brought huge traffic and advertising revenue for relevant user accounts, and diverted potential audience from official authorized broadcast channels中国法院网.
Star Media completed notarized evidence preservation for massive infringing short‑videos existing on Cloud Short‑Video platform. It issued multiple formal takedown notices to Cloud Short‑Video, listing large batches of infringing video links, requesting the platform to delete existing infringing content and take measures to block repeated uploading of similar infringing clips. After receiving notices, Cloud Short‑Video removed part of reported videos. However, identical or substantially similar split‑clip infringing content kept reappearing rapidly on the platform. New infringing videos generated continuously, relying on platform recommendation algorithm to obtain massive exposure. Star Media believed that Cloud Short‑Video failed to fulfill sufficient management obligations and constituted indirect copyright infringement, then filed civil litigation before the intermediate people’s court. The plaintiff requested court to order the defendant to stop infringement, eliminate influence, compensate economic losses and reasonable litigation expenses.
Cloud Short‑Video raised defence arguments based on the safe‑harbour system of the Information Network Dissemination Right Protection Regulations. The platform argued that it only provided neutral information storage service for registered users. All infringing videos were completely uploaded by third‑party individual users. The platform had no subjective intention for copyright violation, had no prior knowledge of specific infringing content, and took‑down notified works after receiving valid notice. According to safe‑harbour rules, the platform should be exempted from compensation liability. The defendant also submitted evidence showing it had set up copyright complaint entrance and user copyright clauses within application software.
The intermediate people’s court conducted comprehensive trial on evidence and legal issues. The court clarified core judgment standards for platform indirect infringement under Chinese copyright judicial practice.
First, the safe‑harbour rule is not an unconditional exemption shield for internet service providers. Qualification for safe‑harbour protection requires not only performing takedown after receiving notice, but also combining specific circumstance to judge whether the platform possesses objective ability to prevent repeated large‑scale infringement. When a certain type of infringing content appears massively and repeatedly on the platform, and the platform has algorithm‑driven operation and content‑recommendation capacity, merely deleting notified single links is insufficient to satisfy its duty of care.
Second, the court confirmed factual findings: clip‑splitting short‑videos involved in this case intercepted massive core plot fragments of the documentary. Continuous browsing of these uploaded short‑clips could enable audiences to grasp main narrative of original documentary, which produced substitutional effect on the market of authorized official broadcasting. Such uploading behaviour by individual users constituted direct infringement of the right of communication through information network.
Third, regarding subjective fault of Cloud Short‑Video: the platform had repeatedly received complaint notices targeting the same documentary clip‑splitting infringement. It knew clearly that this kind of split‑upload behaviour was widespread on its service. Nevertheless, the platform did not adopt effective technical filtering measures aiming at this documentary work. It still distributed relevant infringing videos through content recommendation mechanism, expanding dissemination scope of infringing content. Therefore, the platform possessed subjective fault and could not apply safe‑harbour exemption.
The court rendered final judgment: Cloud Short‑Video constituted indirect copyright infringement. The defendant shall bear civil liabilities including stopping relevant infringement activities and compensating Star Media for economic losses plus reasonable legal costs. Neither party appealed after judgment announcement, and the civil judgment took legal effect.
This case delivers important compliance guidance for domestic and overseas internet platform operators doing business in China. Receiving copyright notice and deleting reported links is only the minimum procedural requirement. When facing large‑scale repeated infringing content of specific copyrighted works, platforms shall match corresponding technical prevention measures according to their own technical capacity. Reliance solely on manual processing of user complaint notices will not avoid indirect infringement liability. For copyright holders, standardized notarized evidence fixation and complete written notice submission are critical prerequisites for succeeding in platform‑related copyright lawsuits. For ordinary content creators, splitting complete audiovisual works and uploading segmented clips without authorization generally falls outside the scope of statutory fair‑use, even with added simple commentary or subtitles.
