Top IP Cases of 2025

In 2025, judges quietly pushed the boundaries on some of the hot topics in IP law including how generative AI interacts with copyright and how far patent disputes can stretch across borders.

Here’s how the year’s biggest IP decisions reshaped the IP litigation playbook, and how you can use them to stand out in applications and interviews.

Getty Images v. Stability AI

What is this case about?

Getty Images sued Stability AI in the English High Court, alleging that the developer’s generative AI model infringed its intellectual property rights. The case was widely expected to answer the question hanging over the creative industries: does training AI on copyrighted material amount to infringement?

Midway through the trial, Getty dropped its core copyright claims, leaving the court to decide narrower issues. The High Court ultimately found that a limited number of AI-generated images infringed Getty’s trademarks, but rejected arguments that the AI model itself infringed copyright.

Crucially, the court held that the model was not an “infringing copy,” that importing it into the U.K. did not amount to infringement, and that the model’s internal weights did not store copyrighted works. Permission to appeal was granted in December, recognising the novelty of the issues.

Why does it matter?