Copyright Cases: 2025 Year in Review
In 2025, most of the headlines about copyright lawsuits focused on AI copyright cases. While some big developments occurred in those cases, there were also a few key non-AI copyright cases in which courts examined critical copyright issues, including in the U.S. Supreme Court which may render decisions in spring or summer of 2026.
Perlmutter v. Blanche: Lawsuit Against White House Over Register’s Dismissal
One of the biggest copyright lawsuits to make the headlines in 2025 was the lawsuit filed by the Register of Copyrights, Shira Perlmutter, against the Trump Administration over her dismissal from the Register position in May 2025.
Perlmutter’s central claims include that the President lacks authority to directly remove the Register of Copyrights and to appoint an Acting Librarian of Congress in Todd Blanche, who also lacks the authority to remove the Register. Perlmutter argues that her dismissal was unconstitutional as the Librarian is the only one who can appoint the Register and is thus the only authority permitted to remove someone from the position. She also argues that Trump’s appointment of an Acting Librarian was made in violation of the Appointments Clause and the Federal Vacancies Reform Act because the Librarian of Congress position is a Presidential appointee subject to Senate confirmation in a legislative branch office.
The U.S. Government’s main arguments include that (1) the Library of Congress is considered an “Executive agency” under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, making Blanche’s appointment as Acting Librarian valid; (2) the President has constitutional authority under Article II to designate acting officials; and (3) even if Blanche wasn’t properly appointed, the President still had direct authority to remove Perlmutter.
The lawsuit is on three procedural tracks. The first two tracks are a motion for preliminary injunction and an emergency order for an injunction pending appeal. In June 2025, Perlmutter filed a motion for preliminary injunction which the district court for the District of Columbia denied the following month. The next month, Perlmutter filed a notice of appeal of the district court’s denial of the motion for preliminary injunction and also an emergency motion for an injunction pending appeal with the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. On September 10, 2025, in a 2-1 decision, the appeals court granted Perlmutter’s emergency motion for an injunction pending appeal that enjoins the defendants from “interfering with appellant’s service as Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office pending further order of the court.” The court opined that the district court abused its discretion in denying Perlmutter’s preliminary injunction motion by failing to consider the “unusual” and “extraordinary” features of the case, including critical questions of separation of powers. Thus, Perlmutter was able to resume her role as Register. The appeals court set a scheduling order for the parties to file briefs on Perlmutter’s appeal of the district court’s denial of her motion for preliminary injunction.
However, on September 17, 2025, the government filed a petition for rehearing en banc of the appeals court’s grant of the injunction pending appeal, which the court denied. The U.S. Solicitor General subsequently filed an application to stay the injunction with the U.S. Supreme Court. At the end of November 2025, the Supreme Court deferred its decision in the case until after it rules on similar requests by the Trump Administration to remove a member of the Federal Trade Commission (Trump v. Slaughter) and a member of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors (Trump v. Cook). The Court issued a brief, unsigned order, which says that Justice Thomas would have granted the application for a stay. Meanwhile, Perlmutter’s appeal of the motion for preliminary injunction at the appeals court level has also been paused until the Supreme Court renders a decision on the government’s motion.
Meanwhile, while Perlmutter remains in her role as Register the case also proceeds at the district court level on a motion for summary judgment. A hearing on the motions was scheduled for November 4, 2025, but was vacated due to the government shutdown. A new hearing date has yet to be scheduled.
In 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court will likely render a decision on the preliminary injunction motion. There will also likely be more movement on the substantive legal issues of the case on a summary judgment motion before the district court. The outcomes may have a lasting impact not only on the status of the Register of Copyrights but also on Copyright Office functions and duties in the future.
Sony v. Cox: Secondary Liability for ISPs
Another major non-AI copyright case of 2025 was the Sony v. Cox case, which the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear in June 2025 and held oral arguments in December. The outcome of the case will be critical to determining the scope and application of contributory liability principles under copyright law, and whether the DMCA will apply at all in the future to Internet Service Providers (ISPs), like Cox Communications (“Cox”), that turn a blind eye to subscribers’ infringing activities.
The case was initially brought by a group of major music labels against Cox in 2018 for its subscribers’ infringement of 10,017 songs owned by plaintiffs. In 2024, the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit overturned parts of a $1 billion dollar jury verdict finding Cox vicariously liable. The Fourth Circuit held that the continued payment by Cox subscribers of monthly fees for internet services was not a financial benefit flowing directly to Cox from the copyright infringement itself. However, the Court did affirm the jury’s verdict finding Cox liable for willful contributory infringement, finding that because internet services were indispensable for the infringing activities, Cox had materially contributed to its subscribers’ direct infringement of plaintiffs’ copyrights.
The parties filed their respective cert petitions to the U.S. Supreme Court, which granted Cox’s cert petition and denied Sony’s cert petition based on a recommendation from the U.S. Solicitor General. The question presented in the case is whether the Fourth Circuit erred in holding that an ISP can be held liable for “materially contributing” to copyright infringement merely because the ISP knew that people were using certain accounts to infringe but did not terminate access, without proof that the ISP engaged in affirmative conduct with the purpose of furthering infringement.
On December 1, 2025, the Supreme Court held a two-hour long hearing during which the Justices expressed concern that a decision for Cox would eliminate any form of secondary liability on behalf of ISPs, render the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s (DMCA) safe harbor provisions meaningless, and disincentivize ISPs from working with copyright owners to combat infringement. At the same time, the Justices also questioned the practicality of imposing liability on ISPs failing to respond to infringement notices directed toward networks covering large amounts of users at places like hospitals and universities. Speaking to the difficulty of the question, Justice Sotomayor said that the Court was “being put to two extremes here.” A final written decision is not expected before spring of 2026, and may affect the outcome of a similar case Universal Recordings, Inc. v. Grande Communications.
As explained further in the Copyright Alliance’s amicus brief in support of the record labels, which was written by Legal Advisory Board member Mitchell Silberberg and Knupp, the Supreme Court must not ignore decades of case law and the Copyright Act’s legislative history which establish that knowingly providing the site and facilities for copyright infringement gives rise to secondary liability. When enacting the DMCA, the brief explains, Congress confirmed the applicability of cases holding that knowingly providing the means for primary infringement constitutes contributory infringement. Further, Cox knew that it was facilitating massive copyright infringement yet continued to provide its service to the infringers, which constitutes willful infringement. The Court should not render a decision that would have a devastating impact on how ISPs can be held liable (if at all) for the infringement of their users.
Sedlik v. Von Drachenberg: Substantial Similarity and Fair Use
In July 2025, the Ninth Circuit held oral arguments in an important fair use case filed by photographer, Jeff Sedlik against tattoo artist, Kat Von D over the unauthorized use of Sedlik’s photograph of Miles Davis in the preparation, promotion, and creation of a Miles Davis tattoo. In the lower district court, a jury in the Central District of California found in favor of Kat Von D, holding that the tattoo and some of the social media posts were not substantially similar to Sedlik’s photograph. Sedlik appealed the decision to the Ninth Circuit. During oral arguments, a three-judge panel in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asked both sides several questions about how the court should review the jury verdict on the intrinsic test and fair use analysis and how to reconcile the intrinsic test with obvious similarities between the two works.
As explained in the Copyright Alliance’s amicus brief in support of Sedlik, written by Legal Advisory Board member Cowan Debaets Abrahams & Sheppard, the district court should have granted Sedlik summary judgment on two issues that were overwhelmingly in his favor–that the two works were substantially similar and that Von D’s use was commercial under the first fair use factor.
On January 2, 2026, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment and issued an opinion on substantial similarity and a shorter, unpublished opinion on fair use. The published opinion is noteworthy because the three judges, in two concurring opinions, explain that they would have found Von D’s tattoo was infringing but for a fundamentally flawed intrinsic test for substantial similarity. Addressing the Ninth Circuit-created “total concept and feel” standard, the judges said it has drifted from its origins and the principles established by the Copyright Clause, the Copyright Act, and the Supreme Court’s copyright case law. The opinions explain that “a test that produces such a result cannot be right” and the judges go on to suggest “dispensing with it altogether.” The case can still be appealed for an en banc review by the Ninth Circuit, where it may be possible for Sedlik to prevail if the intrinsic test is abolished.
UMG v. Internet Archive: Parties Settle Lawsuit Over Mass Digitization of Sound Recordings
On October 16, 2025, the district court for the Northern District of California issued an order dismissing the case with prejudice following a settlement agreement struck between a group of record label plaintiffs and the Internet Archive (IA). The record label plaintiffs originally brought the lawsuit in 2023 against IA, alleging copyright infringement of 2,749 pre-1972 sound recordings for the mass digitization and distribution of those songs as part of IA’s “Great 78 Project.” Through the project, the Internet Archive digitized sound recordings fixed in physical 78 rpm records and uploaded the files to a webpage that allows users to stream and download the recordings.
At one point during the proceedings, plaintiffs argued that the defendants’ fabricated fair use theory to excuse their mass digitization and distribution of the sound recordings is even less tenable than its fair use theory for the mass digitization and distribution of books in the Hachette v. Internet Archive case, which IA had lost. If the court had decided the case, it’s likely the IA’s continued attempts to incorrectly justify mass digitization of copyrighted works as non-infringing activities would have been rejected.
Vetter v. Resnik: Application of Renewal and Termination Rights to “Worldwide” Rights
On January 31, 2025, in Vetter v. Resnik, the district court for the Middle District of Louisiana held that termination rights under the U.S. Copyright Act also re-capture foreign copyrights where the original grant of rights was for “worldwide” rights. The case involves a song called “Double Shot (of My Baby’s Love)” co- authored by Cyril Vetter and Don Smith who assigned their copyright interests to Windsong Music Publishers (Windsong), granting Windsong exclusive “worldwide” rights to the song for the full term of copyright protection. Smith died before his renewal rights vested, meaning that his rights passed to his heirs clear of prior assignments, including the assignment of foreign rights to Windsong. Plaintiff in the case, Smith’s heir’s successor-in-interest, sent a notice of termination to Windsong’s successor and brought a lawsuit, requesting a declaratory judgment that post termination, plaintiff owned both the U.S. and worldwide rights to the song. Defendant filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that plaintiffs had only U.S. rights.
Denying the motion to dismiss, the court determined that the plaintiff’s renewal right from Smith covered both U.S. and worldwide rights and then concluded that it was plausible that because the “worldwide rights were covered by the terminated grant, [the] worldwide rights revert[ed to plaintiff] upon termination.” In granting plaintiff’s subsequent motion for summary judgment, the court adopted its prior analysis and reasoning from its denial of defendant’s motion to dismiss. Copyright Alliance Legal Advisory Board Members, Eric Schwartz and Rebecca Benyamin of Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp LLP, published a blog post on the court’s reasoning and analysis from the motion to dismiss stage. In April 2025, Resnick filed an appeal to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and on November 3, 2025, the court heard oral arguments. It is estimated that the court will render a decision in 2026 which will be groundbreaking to how future termination rights cases will be treated and such rights negotiated and contracted for.
Conclusion
In terms of non-AI copyright cases, 2025 was not a particularly eventful year other than the fact that critical cases were filed and the arguments aired as a setup for important decisions to be rendered in 2026. In 2026, decisions in cases including the Sony, Perlmutter, and Vetter cases will either shift copyright law and the operations of the Copyright Office in unprecedented directions or cement current understandings and applicability of precedential principles. Here’s to hoping that many good decisions that benefit creators and copyright owners will unfold in the near future.
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