Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sony Music Entertainment

by Supreme Court of the United States

Note: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued. The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

COX COMMUNICATIONS, INC., ET AL. v. SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 24–171. Argued December 1, 2025—Decided March 25, 2026

Under the Copyright Act, “[a]nyone who violates any of the exclusive rights of the copyright owner … is an infringer of the copyright.” 17 U. S. C. §501(a). This Court has also recognized two categories of secondary liability, which means liability for the copyright infringement of another. Those two categories are “contributory” liability and “vicarious” liability. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd., 545 U. S. 913, 930.

This case concerns contributory liability, which requires that a provider intended its service to be used for infringement. A copyright owner can show the requisite intent in two ways. First, it can show that a party affirmatively induced the infringement. Ibid. Second, it can show that the party sold a service tailored to infringement. Id., at 942 (Ginsburg, J., concurring). These two bases for contributory liability track patent law. See 35 U. S. C. §§271(b), (c).

Cox Communications, Inc., is an Internet service provider serving approximately six million subscribers, each associated with a unique Internet Protocol address. Internet service providers like Cox have limited knowledge about how their services are used; they know which IP address corresponds to which subscriber account but cannot distinguish individual users or directly control how services are used. Cox contractually prohibits subscribers from using their connection to post, copy, transmit, or disseminate content that infringes copyrights.

Sony Music Entertainment and other major music copyright owners enlisted MarkMonitor to track copyright infringement across the Internet. MarkMonitor’s software detects when copyrighted works are illegally uploaded or downloaded and traces the activity to particular IP addresses. During the roughly two-year period at issue, MarkMonitor sent Cox 163,148 notices identifying IP addresses of Cox subscribers associated with infringement.

Sony sued Cox in Federal District Court, advancing two theories of secondary copyright liability. First, Sony alleged that Cox contributed to its users’ infringement by continuing to provide Internet service to subscribers whose IP addresses Cox knew were associated with infringement. Second, Sony alleged that Cox was vicariously liable for its users’ infringement. The jury found in favor of Sony on both theories, found Cox’s infringement willful, and awarded $1 billion in statutory damages. The District Court denied Cox’s post-trial motion for judgment as a matter of law in relevant part. The Fourth Circuit affirmed as to contributory liability, reasoning that supplying a product with knowledge that the recipient will use it to infringe copyrights is exactly the sort of culpable conduct sufficient for contributory infringement. The Fourth Circuit reversed as to vicarious liability. This Court granted Cox’s petition for certiorari as to contributory liability.

Held: The provider of a service is contributorily liable for a user’s infringement only if it intended that the provided service be used for infringement, which can be shown only if the party induced the infringement or the provided service is tailored to that infringement; Cox neither induced its users’ infringement nor provided a service tailored to infringement; accordingly, Cox is not contributorily liable for the infringement of Sony’s copyrights. Pp. 6–10.

(a) “The Copyright Act does not expressly render anyone liable for infringement committed by another.” Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U. S. 417, 434. Ordinarily, when Congress intends to impose secondary liability, it does so expressly. Central Bank of Denver, N. A. v. First Interstate Bank of Denver, N. A., 511 U. S. 164, 176–177. The Court’s precedents have recognized specific forms of secondary copyright liability that predated the Copyright Act, but the Court is loath to expand such liability beyond those precedents.

Under this Court’s precedents, the intent required for contributory liability can be shown only if the party induced the infringement or the provided service is tailored to that infringement. See Grokster, 545 U. S., at 930; Sony, 464 U. S., at 440–441.

A provider induces infringement if it actively encourages infringement through specific acts, as in Grokster, where file-sharing software companies promoted and marketed their software as a tool to infringe copyrights. See 545 U. S., at 926. A service is tailored to infringement if it is “not capable of ‘substantial’ or ‘commercially significant’ noninfringing uses.” Id., at 942 (Ginsburg, J., concurring). For example, in Sony, the Court held that sale of the Betamax video tape recorder to the general public did not constitute contributory infringement. It reasoned that the tape recorder was “capable of substantial noninfringing uses” because it could be used to record copyrighted television programs for later personal viewing, which would not constitute infringement—even though it could also be used to reproduce and sell copyrighted programming, which would constitute infringement. 464 U. S., at 449, 456. The Court has repeatedly made clear—see Kalem Co. v. Harper Brothers, 222 U. S. 55, Sony, and Grokster—that mere knowledge that a service will be used to infringe is insufficient to establish the required intent to infringe. Pp. 6–9.

(b) Cox neither induced its users’ infringement nor provided a service tailored to infringement. As for inducement, Cox did not “induce” or “encourage” its subscribers to infringe in any manner, Grokster, 545 U. S., at 930; Sony provided no “evidence of express promotion, marketing, and intent to promote” infringement, id., at 926; and Cox repeatedly discouraged copyright infringement by sending warnings, suspending services, and terminating accounts. As for providing a service tailored to infringement, Cox’s Internet service was clearly “capable of ‘substantial’ or ‘commercially significant’ noninfringing uses,” id., at 942; Cox simply provided Internet access, which is used for many purposes other than copyright infringement.

The Fourth Circuit’s holding went beyond the two forms of liability recognized in Grokster and Sony by holding that “supplying a product with knowledge that the recipient will use it to infringe copyrights is … sufficient for contributory infringement.” 93 F. 4th 222, 236. This holding went beyond the two bases for contributory liability recognized in the Court’s precedent and conflicted with the Court’s repeated admonition that contributory liability cannot rest only on a provider’s knowledge of infringement and insufficient action to prevent it. Pp. 9–10.

(c) Sony argues that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act safe harbor—under which Internet service providers cannot be secondarily liable for certain forms of copyright infringement if they have implemented “a policy that provides for the termination in appropriate circumstances of subscribers and account holders” who “are repeated infringers,” 17 U. S. C. §512(i)(1)(A)—would have no effect if Internet service providers are not liable for providing Internet service to known infringers. The DMCA does not expressly impose liability for Internet service providers who serve known infringers; it merely creates new defenses from liability for such providers. The DMCA itself made clear that failure to comply with the safe-harbor rules “shall not bear adversely upon … a defense by the service provider,” as here, “that the service provider’s conduct is not infringing.” §512(l). P. 10.

93 F. 4th 222, reversed and remanded.

Thomas, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts, C. J., and Alito, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, JJ., joined. Sotomayor, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which Jackson, J., joined.

The current edition of this document derives from the electronic version of the "slip opinion" posted online by the Supreme Court of the United States the day the decision was handed down. It is not the final or most authoritative version. It is subject to further revision by the Court and should be replaced with the final edition when it is published in a print volume of the United States Reports. The Court's full disclaimer regarding slip opinions follows:

The "slip" opinion is the second version of an opinion. It is sent to the printer later in the day on which the "bench" opinion is released by the Court. Each slip opinion has the same elements as the bench opinion—majority or plurality opinion, concurrences or dissents, and a prefatory syllabus—but may contain corrections not appearing in the bench opinion. Caution: These electronic opinions may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official printed slip opinion pamphlets. Moreover, a slip opinion is replaced within a few months by a paginated version of the case in the preliminary print, and—one year after the issuance of that print—by the final version of the case in a U. S. Reports bound volume. In case of discrepancies between the print and electronic versions of a slip opinion, the print version controls. In case of discrepancies between the slip opinion and any later official version of the opinion, the later version controls. (source: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/slipopinions.aspx)