Delhi High Court orders WhatsApp to deactivate numbers of users for illegally sharing Apna College study material

The Delhi High Court has ordered WhatsApp to deactivate the mobile numbers of two users accused of copyright infringement for distributing study material uploaded by digital platform, Apna College. [Jainemo Private Limited v. Rahul Shah And Others].Justice Prathiba M Singh found that there was evidence that these users were sharing infringing material and ordered the deactivation of the two numbers, overruling concerns by WhatsApp that the users should be heard first before they are blocked.“If the Defendants are not blocked from disseminating the copyrighted material of the Plaintiff, the Plaintiff would suffer enormous monetary loss apart from loss of subscribers and of goodwill,” the Court observed while passing the order. It ordered the disbanding of the WhatsApp group in question and issued an order of summons to the group's administrator. The Court further flagged concern that the copying and reproduction of such academic course material appeared to be quite easy. .The Court also ordered Telegram to block channels sharing infringing content and to disclose their details so that they can be impleaded in the suit.Moreover, Google was directed to take down a YouTube channel sharing copyrighted works of Apna College. The domain name registrars were also directed to lock and suspend three websites and to share their details.WhatsApp had earlier opposed the plea to block the numbers. It submitted that while action can be taken against WhatsApp groups sharing such content, the deactivation of numbers will result in the blocking of the user’s private communications as well. It, therefore, urged that these persons should be heard before blocking their numbers.Meanwhile, Telegram agreed to provide the information as long as it is used exclusively for the purposes of the legal proceedings.“These details shall only be used for the purposes of the present suit, and no other purposes,” the Court ordered accordingly..The order was passed in the suit filed by Jainemo Private Limited, which sells educational material and runs vocational courses on coding, computer programming and website development on its website, which is run under the name Apna College. The company alleged that various unknown individuals or entities have started disseminating its content on platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram and YouTube and were even collecting fees from the students for it. It argued that its videos were protected under the Copyright Act..After perusing the record, Justice Singh noted that each of the groups or channels on these platforms have hundreds of subscribers and that a case had been established for the grant of an injunction. The Court held that Apna College holds ownership over the course material as “literary works” and over videos as “cinematographic films” under the Copyright Act. “Given that the Plaintiffs' works are safeguarded by the Copyright Act, 1957, any unauthorized distribution or communication, whether in print or electronic form, would amount to copyright infringement,” the Court said. .The Court proceeded to restrain a total of 18 defendants from downloading, uploading, storing, sharing, transmitting, selling, offering for sale, storing or utilising any of the course material of the plaintiff in the Alpha, Delta and Alpha Plus courses on any electronic platform.The matter will be heard next in March 2024. .Advocate Karan Bajaj, Rupin Bahl and Pooja Arora represented Apna College.Advocates Anushka Sharda, Madhav Khosla and Moha Paranjpe appeared for Telegram.Advocates Tejas Karia, Swati Agarwal, Mohit Singh, Vaarish Sawlani and Ritika Bansal represented WhatsApp.Advocates Aditya Gupta, Raunaq Kamath, Aishwarya Kane and Sauhard Alung represented Google.Advocates Mrinal Ojha, Debarshi Dutta, Anand Raja, Tanya Chaudhry, Samyak Bilala and Shivam Tiwari represented GoDaddy.[Read Order]