Copyright Enforcement against Purpose-Built Infringing Platforms

Introduction : Digital access has transformed the relationship between copyright and public knowledge. Academic articles, books, films, music and software can be distributed globally at minimal cost through online platforms. The same infrastructure can also enable systematic reproduction and dissemination of copyrighted works without authorisation. The legal difficulty is most acute where a platform presents itself as a public-access project but is built around the unauthorised distribution of protected material.

The Delhi High Court’s 2025 proceedings in Elsevier Ltd v. Alexandra Elbakyan illustrate this conflict. The case concerned Sci-Hub and Sci-Net, online repositories associated with the mass availability of academic articles without the permission of publishers. On 19 August 2025, the Court directed the relevant government authorities and internet service providers to block access to identified Sci-Hub, Sci-Net and mirror domains. The Court also found, prima facie, that Alexandra Elbakyan had breached an undertaking given in 2020 by uploading and making available the plaintiffs’ copyrighted works.

The core principle emerging from the order is not that access to knowledge lacks social value. Nor is it that every platform offering free access to information is unlawful. The principle is narrower and more significant: where a platform’s primary purpose is the systematic reproduction and dissemination of copyrighted works without permission, a general appeal to research, education or public interest cannot by itself justify continued infringement.

This principle has consequences beyond Sci-Hub. It concerns the circumstances in which courts may grant platform-wide or dynamic injunctions, extend blocking orders to mirror sites and treat the architecture of a service as evidence of its purpose. It also clarifies why copyright exceptions must be applied to the particular use of a work rather than to the broad social objective claimed by the defendant.

Copyright and Digital Dissemination

The Copyright Act 1957 grants copyright owners exclusive rights over protected works. For literary works, these include reproduction, issuing copies and communication to the public. Academic articles ordinarily fall within literary works, and publishers may acquire rights from authors through publishing agreements or assignments. 

A digital repository may infringe in more than one way. It may reproduce the article on its server, store a copy in a database, distribute or communicate it to users, or facilitate access through links that are part of an organised delivery system. The scale and repeated nature of the activity can distinguish a purpose-built repository from an individual act of infringement.

The relevant question is not simply whether users benefit from access. Copyright law routinely permits public benefit through defined mechanisms, including educational use, research, criticism, libraries and licensing arrangements. The question is whether the defendant’s particular conduct falls within a statutory exception or has been authorised by the copyright owner.

This distinction prevents the public-interest argument from becoming unlimited. A person may use a protected article for private study or criticism under the statutory conditions. That does not necessarily authorise the creation of a permanent public repository containing thousands or millions of articles for anyone to download.

The Public-Interest Argument

Defendants operating access platforms may claim that copyright enforcement restricts education, scientific research and medical progress. The argument has particular force where academic publishing is expensive, researchers lack institutional subscriptions and publicly funded research is placed behind paywalls.

These concerns are real. The availability of research can affect scientific collaboration, clinical knowledge and educational opportunity. An effective legal analysis must acknowledge that copyright exists within a social and constitutional environment rather than in isolation from public welfare.

However, public interest does not automatically convert unauthorised copying into lawful use. The court must examine whether the statutory scheme already accommodates the relevant public interest and whether the defendant’s method is proportionate to the objective. If the platform reproduces complete works, distributes them at scale and disregards the rights of publishers, the public benefit may not be enough to defeat the copyright claim.

The issue is also institutional. A platform that distributes works without authorisation may shift the cost of access from users to copyright owners, authors, publishers and research institutions. It may also undermine licensing systems that support editing, peer review, archiving, indexing and distribution. Whether those systems operate fairly is a policy question, but a defendant cannot unilaterally replace them by copying the protected output.

The better legal position is that public interest may influence remedies, proportionality and the design of a legislative exception, but it does not create a free-standing defence to infringement.

The Principle of Purpose-Built Infringement

The central distinction is between incidental infringement and a service designed primarily to facilitate infringement.

An ordinary platform may host user content, provide search functionality or link to external information. Its service may have substantial lawful uses even if some users infringe copyright. In such a case, the court may need to identify specific works, determine the platform’s knowledge and consider intermediary protections.

A purpose-built infringing platform is different. Its design, content collection, indexing system, user interface, domain structure and operational model may show that the service exists principally to make unauthorised copies available. The platform may obtain works through access credentials, reproduce them in a central repository and organise them for efficient downloading. In that situation, the platform’s role is not merely incidental to infringement. The infringing activity is the service.

The Delhi High Court’s reasoning in the Sci-Hub proceedings reflects this distinction. The Court considered the primary purpose of the websites, the flagrant nature of the infringement, the apparent disregard for copyright and the existence of blocking measures in other jurisdictions. These factors supported the conclusion that continued access required intervention. 

Purpose matters because remedies must be proportionate to the defendant’s actual operation. A platform that has no meaningful lawful function may justify broader relief than a general-purpose service where only particular files are infringing.

Dynamic Injunctions and Mirror Domains

A traditional injunction identifies the defendant and the specific infringing material. The internet complicates that approach because an infringing service can move to a new domain, create a mirror site or use a redirect shortly after an order is issued. If courts were required to begin a new lawsuit for each domain variation, enforcement would become ineffective.

A dynamic injunction addresses this problem by permitting the rights holder to extend an existing blocking order to newly identified mirror or redirect websites that reproduce the same infringing service. The remedy is designed to prevent a defendant from defeating the court’s order through technical changes in location.

The Delhi High Court had previously recognised dynamic injunction principles in UTV Software Communication Ltd v. 1337X.to. That case concerned websites whose primary purpose was to facilitate copyright infringement. The Court developed factors for determining when blocking an entire website could be justified, including the extent and flagrancy of infringement, the primary purpose of the website, the disregard for copyright and the availability of other enforcement options.

In the Elsevier proceedings, the Court applied this type of reasoning to Sci-Hub, Sci-Net and their associated mirrors. It directed action against identified domains and later extended the operation of the blocking directions to additional mirror websites, redirects and alphanumeric variations.

Dynamic relief is powerful because it affects access at the infrastructure level. It can also raise concerns about overblocking, mistaken identification and transparency. The remedy should therefore remain connected to the original finding. A newly identified domain should be demonstrably connected to the same infringing service, not merely similar in appearance or content.

Undertakings and Court Authority

The 2025 order also involved a breach of undertaking. In 2020, Elbakyan had undertaken not to upload or transmit the plaintiffs’ copyrighted works through any platform. The Court found, prima facie, that uploading and making the works available through Sci-Hub and Sci-Net violated that undertaking. 

An undertaking given to a court has a distinct legal significance. It is not merely a private promise. Once accepted, it becomes part of the court’s process, and deliberate breach may attract contempt-related consequences. The principle reinforces the importance of compliance with interim arrangements even where the defendant disputes the broader merits of the copyright claim.

This aspect of the case also shows why a later change in domain or technical system may not avoid responsibility. If the undertaking concerns uploading or transmitting copyrighted works through any platform, moving the activity from one website to another may still constitute a breach.

The Pre-Elsevier Position

The Elsevier proceedings fit within a developing Indian approach to online copyright enforcement. In Super Cassettes Industries Ltd v. MySpace Inc, the Delhi High Court distinguished between a platform that hosts user content and a platform that directly participates in infringement. The decision emphasised the importance of specific knowledge and the protection available to intermediaries under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act 2000.

In MySpace Inc v. Super Cassettes Industries Ltd, the Division Bench confirmed that a platform should not be held automatically liable merely because infringing material may exist within a large user-generated system. Specific identification and a meaningful opportunity to remove the material remained important.

The Sci-Hub situation is materially different. A purpose-built repository that systematically collects and distributes copyrighted articles cannot rely on the same reasoning as a general-purpose intermediary that passively processes user communications. The platform’s primary purpose, degree of control and operational design are relevant to determining whether it is entitled to safe harbour or whether it is a direct participant in infringement.

The comparison demonstrates that Indian law does not adopt either extreme. It does not treat every online intermediary as liable for every user act, and it does not protect a service whose essential function is unauthorised distribution.

Access to Knowledge and Law Reform

The order highlights a policy gap. If academic publishers’ licensing models produce serious access barriers, the solution may require reform in public funding, institutional subscriptions, open-access mandates, library licensing, government repositories or statutory exceptions. Copyright litigation can prevent unlawful distribution, but it cannot by itself resolve the affordability and accessibility of research.

A sustainable system should distinguish between lawful open access and unauthorised copying. Authors, institutions and governments may adopt policies requiring publicly funded research to be deposited in repositories. Publishers may offer lower-cost access for researchers in developing countries. Licensing systems may permit text and data mining, classroom use and library preservation.

The existence of a public-interest problem should therefore encourage better legal and institutional responses, not weaken the principle that copyright works cannot be commercially or systematically reproduced without authority.

Conclusion

The core principle emerging from Elsevier Ltd v. Alexandra Elbakyan is that a platform created primarily to reproduce and distribute copyrighted works without authorisation cannot justify its operation merely by invoking education, research or public access. Where infringement is flagrant, systematic and central to the platform’s purpose, courts may grant broad blocking relief, including dynamic directions addressing mirror websites and redirects.

This principle does not make every link, host or user-generated platform automatically liable. The cases concerning MySpace show that intermediary status, specific knowledge, control and response remain important where infringement is incidental to a broader lawful service.

The legal balance is therefore functional and proportionate. Platforms that provide neutral technological infrastructure should receive appropriate protection, while purpose-built infringement services should not obtain safe harbour by describing themselves as public-interest repositories. The long-term solution to unequal access to knowledge lies in licensing reform, open-access policy and institutional support. It cannot depend on the systematic unauthorised reproduction of works whose copyright remains legally protected.

Author: Amrita Pradhan in case of any queries please contact/write back to us via email to content@khuranaandkhurana.com or at  Khurana & Khurana, Advocates and IP Attorney.

References

1. Elsevier Ltd v. Alexandra Elbakyan, 2025 SCC OnLine Del 5678.

2. Copyright Act, 1957, Section 13, 14 and 51.

3. UTV Software Communication Ltd v 1337X.to, 2019 SCC OnLine Del 11967.

4. Information Technology Act, 2000, Section 79.

5. Super Cassettes Industries Ltd v. MySpace Inc., 2011 SCC OnLine Del 4712.

6. MySpace Inc v Super Cassettes Industries Ltd., 2016 SCC OnLine Del 6382.

7. Copyright Act, 1957, Section 52.

8. The Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of the University of Oxford v. Rameshwari Photocopy Services, 2016 SCC OnLine Del 5128.

9. R G Anand v. Deluxe Films (1978) 4 SCC 118.

10. Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) 5 SCC 1.