Getty Images -v- Stability AI [2025] EWHC 2863 (Ch)

Background

On 4^th November 2025 a London High Court handed down the Judgement in Getty Images v Stability AI. At the outset of proceedings, Getty, a leading stock image provider, alleged primary and secondary copyright infringement, database right infringement, trade mark infringement and passing off against the Defendant, Stability AI, an open-source generative AI Company that owns and operates the AI Model Stable Diffusion. Getty accused Stability AI of using its copyright-protected images without permission to train its AI model.

Abandonment of Claims

At trial Getty dropped the primary copyright infringement and database infringement claims against Stability. These elements were dropped on the grounds that they did not have sufficient evidence to demonstrate that the training took place within the United Kingdom, which is a requirement under UK law.

By the end of the trial in June 2025, only two primary elements of claims remained. The first was whether Stable Diffusion secondarily infringed on Getty’s copyright under sections 22 and 23 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CDPA). The second was whether Stability had infringed on Getty’s trade marks due to the presence of watermark-like features in AI images generated by Stable Diffusion under 10(1), 10(2) or 10(3) Trade Marks Act 1994 (TMA).

The Court’s Findings

Over two years since the claim was initiated, the Judge handed down a judgment with a split outcome. Getty narrowly won on trade mark grounds while Stability AI prevailed on the copyright claims.

The Trade Mark Infringement Claim

Getty alleged that Stability committed trade mark infringement under sections 10(1), 10(2), and 10(3) TMA by reason of the fact that it had affixed watermark features which are identical or similar to Getty’s marks, to the images generated by Stable Diffusion. Getty’s trade mark infringement claims fell under two categories: those generated by Getty specifically for proceedings, and examples generated by third parties unrelated to Getty.

The Judge dismissed the claim in relation to the first type of images generated in-house by Getty as she found no evidence that the prompts used by Getty to generate the images were used by any UK users, nor had they generated watermarks from the prompts.

However, the Judge concluded that it is likely that at least one user in the UK had generated an image that displayed a Getty watermark and as such this gave rise to infringement. The Judge noted her findings as “extremely limited”. The 10 (1) and 10(2) claims narrowly succeeded, however the 10(3) claim was dismissed as there was not adequate evidence of the requisite harm or change in consumer behaviour.

The Judge declined to rule on the issue of passing off as neither party invited her to do so.

Secondary Copyright Infringement Claim

Secondary acts of infringement are broadly addressed to downstream dealings or involvement, as opposed to acts which originate reproductions of copyright works. In this case, Getty claimed that the article is infringing on their copyright because it had been imported into the United Kingdom. This gave rise to two questions of law: (1) whether the model weights (numerical parameters that determine the importance of features in a dataset) constituted an “article” under sections 22 and 23 CDPA, and (2) whether they constituted an “infringing copy” under section 27. The Judge concluded that the model weights did constitute an article, however the model weights at no point contained copies of any of Getty’s works, and as such it is not capable of constituting an “infringing copy”. Getty’s secondary infringement claim was dismissed.

What is the impact of this Judgement

This case demonstrates:

• Where there is no evidence of the processing occurring in the UK, the copying for the purposes of training does not constitute infringement;
• Training AI on large datasets without storing or reproducing the data does not constitute copyright infringement; and
• Where AI produces an image that displays a protected trade mark, then there is a risk of trade mark infringement.

If you would like any further information or advice on the information mentioned within this article, please contact James Milliken from the Commercial team.

*This information is for guidance purposes only and does not constitute, nor should be regarded as, a substitute for taking legal advice that is tailored to your circumstances.