Apple ordered to pay $1.9 million to Chinese publisher over copyright case

A Chinese publishing group has won a $1.9 million case against Apple for how the company fails to stop other publishers selling copyright content in the App Store.

The Tianjin Binhai People's Court has sided with a local subsidary of China's COL Digital Publishing Group in a case against Apple and the App Store. The online publisher claims that multiple rivals had released apps which included material, such as popular novels, whose rights belong to COL Digital.

According to the South China Morning Post, COL Digital claims that Apple should be responsible for the copyright infringement of these other apps. It accused Apple of failing to conduct due diligence.

Reportedly, the publisher has been embroiled in a total of four legal battles with Apple since 2012. While this latest ruling sees Apple ordered to pay 12 million yuan ($1.9 million), it appears to be only one part of an ongoing case.

South China Morning Post says that COL Digital's full lawsuit centers on 83 separate incidents of copyright infringement, and involves 460 cases of intellectual properties.

17 Comments

Kuyangkoh 838 comments · 7 Years

About 3 years ago

Apple….just raise the price of your devices.

OutdoorAppDeveloper 1292 comments · 15 Years

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

verne arase 479 comments · 11 Years

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

waveparticle 1497 comments · 3 Years

verne arase said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

You are too political.

tmay 6455 comments · 11 Years

waveparticle said:

verne arase said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

You are too political.

Verne is correct though.

Interestingly enough, the Philippines President Dutarte, is turning his back on the PRC, and is again embracing the U.S. as a security partner, and that is driven by the public outrage against China's militarization of the South China Seas.

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/philippines-protests-beijings-provocative-acts-south-china-sea-2021-10-20/

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/us-philippines-defense-alliance