Stevens v. CoreLogic, Inc., No. 16-56089 (9th Cir. 2018)
Annotate this CaseThe Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for CoreLogic in an action brought under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Plaintiffs, professional real estate photographers, alleged that CoreLogic removed copyright management information from their photographs and distributed their photographs with the copyright management information removed, in violation of 17 U.S.C. 1202(b)(1)–(3). The panel held that section 1202(b) requires an affirmative showing that the defendant knew the prohibited act would induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal infringement. In this case, plaintiffs failed to make the required affirmative showing because they failed to produce evidence showing that CoreLogic knew its software carried even a substantial risk of inducing, enabling, facilitating, or concealing infringement, let alone a pattern or probability of such a connection to infringement. The panel affirmed the district court's denial of plaintiffs' discovery request and the award of fees.
Court Description: Copyright Law. The panel affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of CoreLogic, Inc., on professional real estate photographers’ claims that CoreLogic removed copyright management information from their photographs and distributed their photographs with the copyright management information removed, in violation of 17 U.S.C. § 1202(b)(1)-(3), a part of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The photographers alleged that CoreLogic’s Multiple Listing Services software removed copyright management information metadata from their photographs. The panel held that § 1202(b) requires a showing that the defendant knew the prohibited act would “induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal” infringement. The panel concluded that the photographers did not offer evidence to satisfy this mental state requirement because they did not provide evidence from which one could infer that future infringement was likely, albeit not certain, to occur as a result of the removal or alteration of copyright management information. The panel affirmed the district court’s rulings regarding discovery and costs. STEVENS V. CORELOGIC 3
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on August 6, 2018.
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