Intellectual Property Law – An International Concern

Introduction

In today’s day and age, there is a constant question of whether a creator’s work is done by themself or through the work of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The world of Artificial Intelligence has been rapidly growing and it’s becoming a concern to the world at large. Artists have been using trademarks, patents and copyright, among other methods, to protect their work and keep it from being used for AI generation or AI training. Before the AI bubble rose so quickly, there were cases of companies, institutions and even other individuals going to court over creations that they claimed were their own and used without permission.

Intellectual Property Law (IPL) are the rules and regulations that protect the intellectual work as well as its creators to prevent others from plagiarizing or using their work without their permission. While the field is still evolving, it has become an important aspect of protecting the carefully crafted creations of artists worldwide.

Caselaw and Analysis

As previously mentioned, IPL aims to protect the intellectual work of creators as well as the creators themselves. A few of the more common types of intellectual property would include patents, copyright and trademark which will be elaborated on with its relevant caselaw.

Patents are the rights granted to a creator for their invention. It gives the creator full control over their product/invention, its publication, selling, and more. In order to get a patent, the creator must make certain technical information about the creation publicly available in an official document.

 Apple Inc v Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd (2012) is a common case cited when understanding Intellectual Property Law.^[1] Apple sued Samsung for infringing on its patents for the design of its products. The specific design in question was the rectangular screen with rounded corners having the same feel as an Apple product. Samsung argued that the general design and feel of the product(s) were to look somewhat similar considering they were selling similar products and it was thus, not protectable.

The jury sided with Apple and Samsung was ordered to pay around $1 billion dollars in damages. Unsatisfied with their decision, Samsung appealed the damages and the case went to the Supreme Court where the court ultimately ruled in favor of Samsung citing that, in this specific case, does not have to pay that amount in damages if the infringed aspects only take up a certain aspect of the patent, here it is the design patent. The two major companies privately settled the matter in 2018.

The landmark case Alice Corp v CLS Bank International (2014) established the test used in order to determine whether a certain software or even idea is eligible for a patent or not.^[2] Defendants Alice Corp held patents for a software for financial transactions ensuring that both parties in trade benefited each other via transferring funds only if the other party did too. Claimants, CLS Bank International sued the defendants citing that the patents Alice Corp were invalid as the software was an idea.

As mentioned, this case led to the establishment of the test to determine the eligibility of a concept, software or idea for a patent. The test is divided into two parts, the first is for the court to determine whether the claim(s) made are related to an idea or concept. Should the first test be satisfied, the second is for the court to estimate whether the concept fits the required elements to turn that concept into a completely new and inventive concept.

The US Supreme Court ruled in favor of the claimants, CLS Bank International, ruling the patents invalid because the software claim was just an idea and its implementation on a computer made for general use did not do anything new in terms of innovation.

Copyright is a well-known term to many around the world. It describes the exclusive rights held by creators over their work, ranging from artistic work like music, art, literary work to more technical work like advertisements, technical programs, etc.

R.G. Anand v Delux Films (1978) is a landmark case in which the Indian Supreme Court established that copyright protects the expressions of a certain idea, not the actual idea.^[3]

The Claimant, R.G. Anand created a play in 1954 centering around regional stereotypes with cultural aspects. A few years later in 1956, the defendants Delux Films’s director released a film centering around the same idea with a different plot. R.G. Anand sued Delux Films for Copyright infringement making the claim that certain aspects of his play were used by the production company without permission.

The court had to consider various factors including determining where copyright was applicable to the expression of an idea or simply the idea itself. It was settled that while the expression of an idea was viable for copyright infringement, the actual idea is open to anyone to use. Additionally, it was cited that for a party to make a claim for infringement, there must be substantial evidence showing that the two works are similar, and their claim is further supported if the general public are able to identify the similarities, without knowing the concepts of the work created.

The court ultimately ruled in favor of the defendants, Delux Films citing no infringement on their part for creating something that had a similar idea to the play created by R.G. Anand.

Similar to R.G. Anand, Eastern Book Company v D.B. Modak (2008) deals with the concept of copyright, however here, there is an importance laid on the Copyright Act 1957.^[4] The Act provides the understanding of the different and exclusive rights that are granted to creators and innovators to protect their work as well as the legal aspects that can be used to make a claim in court. The Act itself cites protection for the creators and their works including books, dramatic theatre, music, and more.

The claimants, Eastern Book Company, made a copyright claim over the edited and formatted versions of the Supreme Court judgements against the defendant, D.B. Modak. The court ruled in favor of the claimants citing that they had copyright protection owing to the efforts taken by them to format and edit the judgements.

Another common term is trademark. It’s the sign seen on various products, brands and services of an enterprise that distinguishes it from others. When an enterprise owns a certain trademark, no other enterprise is allowed to use it.

In Google France SARL v Louis Vuitton Malletier (2010) was a landmark case that went to the European Court of Justice, where it was established that search engines are not to be held liable for violating trademark law if advertisers buy and display ads which would appear when the public searched up certain keywords.^[5]

The main concern of this case centered around Google AdWords where advertisers purchased certain specific keywords allowing counterfeiters and scammers to appear by legitimate websites. These are well terms relating to luxury brands and products. Louis Vuitton argued in court that by allowing these types of ads to go online, it cleared the pathway for third parties thus making Googling liable for violating its trademark rights.

Google cited having protection from the EU E-Commerce Directive shielding its intermediaries from liability, this was satisfied in the final ruling of the court.

The court ruled in favor of Google, citing the fact that the search engine was acting as a middle-man or intermediary for displaying ads, it did not create those ads nor did it create the content of the ads. In other words, the court saw that Google would only hold liability if it held an active role in creating or managing the content of the ads; however, it must be noted that the court emphasized that the enterprise should take an effort to remove any such ads once they are aware of them.

From all of these cases we are able to gather that intellectual property has been and still is growing from claims of copying a play all the way to the very design of a product. It’s still growing considerably since Artificial Intelligence came into play.

In the legal sphere, AI has been used to help firms simplify terms and tasks making things easier and more efficient. Reviewing and revising caselaw and statutes have also become a lot easier since firms started to use AI, though with caution.

While it has its pros, AI and creativity have not yet seen eye-to-eye and this is becoming more and more evident with the prevalence of AI-generated artwork. Online renditions of people’s hard work and creativity are being used to train AI models and it is often not only uploaded for the general public to view but it is done without the original creators permission.

When work is completely generated by an AI model, it doesn’t carry any essence of human creativity and thus cannot be a claim for copyright infringement. No patents, or trademarks exist here either making matters somewhat complicated. Individuals or parties who post these types of content can be held for copyright infringement if they post a creation similar to another creator’s work, if it is copyrighted.

Conclusion

Intellectual Property Law or IPL protects artists, creators and innovators and their work by giving them exclusive rights to their creations. It acts as a shield to prevent people from using a person’s work as their own and preserving the creativity and hard work. Three of the more commonly known types of Intellectual Property are patents, the exclusive rights held by the owner of a creation to do as they please with it, copyright,  the term used to describe the rights held by the owner and finally, trademark, the sign held by an enterprise for their products, brands and services distinguishing it from other enterprises.

Further, there was a discussion of how Intellectual Property Law is a vast and still evolving field in law even though these topics have been coming up in court for multiple years, the field has only expanded in more recent times especially with the use of Artificial Intelligence or AI. The AI field is somewhat complicated when it comes to content generation but claims still make it to court when content including images, videos or even graphics are generated using AI after giving it an individual’s work as a sample or sample for training. The whole idea of IPL is to preserve an individual’s or party’s own creativity and hard work and recognise it for such. This was further explained when discussing the relevant caselaw.

Some of the more relevant caselaw discussed was a case between two multi-billion dollar companies, Apple and Samsung, over a design patent wherein Apple claimed Samsung adopted a design similar to their products. Another followed the situation over the ads available on the search engine Google. Louis Vuitton claimed that Google should be held liable for letting advertisers, mentioned for a few to be counterfeiters,  buy ad space and use those keywords, usually associated with luxury brands, to appear instead of the legitimate websites.

These cases are one of many showing how IPL has been associated with the court, with many cases appearing with claims over aspects of their products or services who, as the general public, would not have noticed until it became a larger issue.

In brighter news, Intellectual Property has been growing more and more over the last decade with sustainable IP or green IP. These are those innovations and creations that are environmentally friendly and are leading to greener developments in recent years.

Overall, Intellectual Property Law is a rapidly evolving field and with the new era of Artificial Intelligence coming in, it has only shown the importance that this field holds today and how it will only continue to evolve in the future with the aim to protect artists and their creations giving an emphasis to original work.

Bibliography

Cases

• Alice Corporation v CLS Bank International 573 US 208 (2014)
• Eastern Book Co v D.B. Modak [2008] 1 SCC 1
• Google France SARL and Google Inc v Louis Vuitton Malletier SA (Joined cases C-236/08, C-237/08 and C-238/08) ECLI:EU:C:2010:159 [2010] ECR I-2417
• G. Anand v Delux Films [1978] 4 SCC 118
• Samsung Electronics (UK) Ltd v Apple Inc [2012] EWCA Civ 1339

Legislation

• Copyright Act 1957.

Secondary Sources

• K&K Khurana & Khurana, ‘Analysis of R.G. Anand v M/S Deluxe Films And Its Relevance in Recent Times’ (khuranaandkhurana.com , January 11 2022) <https://www.khuranaandkhurana.com/2022/01/11/analysis-of-r-g-anand-v-m-s-deluxe-films-and-its-relevance-in-recent-times> accessed 22 June 2026.
• Sesha Dhriti B., ‘Originality After Eastern Book Company v D.B. Modak: Has India Found Its Own Copyright Threshold’ (com, 17 June 2026) <https://www.ijllr.com/post/originality-after-eastern-book-company-v-d-b-modak-has-india-found-its-own-copyright-threshold> accessed 22 June 2026.

^[1] Samsung Electronics (UK) Ltd v Apple Inc [2012] EWCA Civ.

^[2] Alice Corp v CLS Bank International 573 US 208 (2014).

^[3] R.G. Anand v Delux Films [1978] AIR 1613 (SC).

^[4] Eastern Book Co v D.B. Modak [2008] 1 SCC 1.

^[5] Joined cases C-236/08 to C-238/08 Google France SARL v Louis Vuitton Malletier SA [2010] ECR I-2417.