Guangzhou Internet Court Civil Judgment (2024) Yue 0192 Min Chu No. 113.
Tsuburaya Productions Co., Ltd. (Tsuburaya), a Japanese company, is the copyright owner of the famous cartoon “IP - Ultraman” series. Tsuburaya granted to Shanghai Character License Administrative Co., Ltd. (SCLA), plaintiff, an exclusive right to do acts in China, including the right of reproduction, the right to prepare derivative works, and also the right to enforce copyrights. Tsuburaya has also registered its Ultraman series pictures at the Chinese Copyright Office. Defendant (company A) provides text-to-picture AI generating services through its website.
On 8 February 2024, Guangzhou Internet Court rendered a verdict in China’s first case concerning the infringement of AIGC outputs, finding the defendant, a text-to-image AIGC provider, liable for infringing the copyrights of Ultraman IP. The court also discussed China’s first AI regulation - the Interim Measures for the Management of Generative Artificial Intelligence Services issued on 10 July 2023 (2023 GAI Measures), concluding that defendant had failed to exercise reasonable duty of care in generating its AIGC output, thus violating the 2023 GAI Measures.