Artificial Intelligence And Copyright Law: Rethinking Authorship, Ownership And Originality In The Digital Era

Abstract

The rapid advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AI), particularly generative AI, has transformed the manner in which creative works are conceived, produced, and disseminated. Contemporary AI systems are increasingly capable of generating literary works, visual art, music, photographs, software code, and audiovisual content with limited or, in some cases, minimal human intervention. This technological development has created significant challenges for conventional copyright law, which has historically been premised upon human creativity, authorship, and intellectual contribution. The emergence of AI-generated works therefore raises fundamental questions concerning who should be recognised as the author, who should own copyright, and whether works produced substantially through autonomous computational processes can satisfy the legal requirement of originality. In India, the Copyright Act, 1957 provides a comprehensive framework for protecting original literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works; however, it does not expressly address the legal status of works generated independently by Artificial Intelligence. The statutory concepts of “author” and “first owner” under Sections 2(d) and 17 respectively are substantially structured around human or legally recognised entities, creating uncertainty in cases involving AI-generated outputs. Further, the originality standard developed through judicial decisions, particularly the requirement of sufficient intellectual effort and creativity, becomes difficult to apply where the creative process involves autonomous machine generation. Questions also arise concerning the use of copyrighted works for training generative AI models and the potential infringement of existing copyright.