Can AI Be An Author? Rethinking Copyright Protection For AI-Generated Content In India
Anya Bharti, Army Institute of Law
ABSTRACT
Rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have altered the creation of creative works and created a number of new challenges for copyright law. Literary, artistic, musical, and other creative works can now be produced by generative AI tools with varying degrees of human involvement. This raises significant issues under Indian copyright law, especially with regard to whether an AI system can be considered an author and, if not, who should be the owner of the copyright in such works. It can be difficult to apply some of the Copyright Act, 1957's current provisions to modern works made with artificial intelligence because it was designed with human authorship in mind. The recent DABUS ruling, which distinguishes the issue of legal authorship from the issue of originality in AI-generated works, is examined in this article along with the topic of AI authorship under Indian law. We also look at the copyright issues that arise when AI systems are trained using protected works. The article also compares the approaches adopted in the US, UK, and EU. The article makes the case that India needs more specific laws regarding ownership and authorship, the role of human involvement in AIgenerated works, and the use of copyrighted works for AI training. Such regulations can give creators and AI developers more legal certainty while enabling technological advancement without diminishing the importance of human creativity and copyright protection.
