SCOTUS Rules ISPs Not Liable for Piracy in Music Rights Case
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously last week against music industry record labels in a high-profile content piracy case brought against the country’s third-largest internet service provider (ISP). The ruling has implications that impact content piracy mitigation efforts in creative industries across the board, including adult entertainment. One of the core sentiments in the Supreme Court's ruling is that an ISP cannot be held liable for the actions of a third party. In 2018, rights holders, including Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group, and Warner Music, sued Cox Communications. A lower court handed the music industry a verdict of about $1 billion a year later. But Cox was able to bring the case on appeal all the way to the high court. There, the bench ruled, 9-0, in favor of the ISP because, per Justice Clarence Thomas writing for the court, "a company is not liable as a copyright infringer for merely providing a service to the general public with knowledge that it will be used by some to infringe copyrights." The case was appealed to SCOTUS from the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled in 2024 that the $1 billion verdict was not justified and…
