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ARTICLE · 12 APRIL 2021

Colossal Win For Google As SCOTUS Affirms ‘Fair Use'

Kochhar & Co.
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The protracted legal battle between software giant Oracle America Inc. ("Oracle") and technology behemoth Google LLC ("Google") has truly been one for the ages.

IndiaIntellectual Property
Daksh Kumar
Daksh Kumar
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The protracted legal battle between software giant Oracle America Inc. (“Oracle”) and technology behemoth Google LLC (“Google”) has truly been one for the ages. The Supreme Court of the United States of America (“SCOTUS”) on 05 April 2021 delivered its judgment in the writ of Certiorari filed by Google against Oracle. The core issues were:

  • Copyrightability of copied lines of the Java SE Application Programming Interface ("API”) which were proprietary to Sun Microsystems (“Sun”), later acquired by Oracle;
  • Legitimacy of Fair Use defence by Google, absolving them of copyright liability.

The present case deals with computer code and copyright law (US Code Title 17) wherein Google admitted to using the APIs (developed originally by Sun) for initial versions of its Android operating system but argued that their usage was well within the scope of ‘Fair Use'.

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