Chinese courts are closing a door that has been open for years. In a series of rulings across multiple provinces, judges are now rejecting copyright infringement lawsuits filed by entities that hold only procedural litigation rights—no genuine commercial stake in the works they claim to protect. For internet platforms caught in the crossfire of mass copyright enforcement campaigns, this judicial shift could mean fewer frivolous lawsuits, but also a more complex enforcement landscape to navigate.

At the center of this shift is a deceptively simple legal question: does a company that acquired the right to sue—but not the right to use, license, or commercially exploit a copyrighted work—qualify as a plaintiff under Article 122 of China's Civil Procedure Law, which requires a "direct interest" in the dispute?

A growing number of Chinese courts are answering no.

The Anatomy of a Copyright Troll Lawsuit in China

To understand what's changing, you need to understand how mass copyright litigation works in China.

The typical structure looks like this: a law firm identifies copyrighted content—usually web novels, stock images, or music videos—where the rights chain is complex or the original rights holder is difficult to locate. The firm then approaches a content platform or rights aggregator, negotiates a transfer of litigation rights, and either creates a shell company or uses an existing affiliate as the nominal plaintiff. This entity files hundreds or thousands of lawsuits against internet platforms and their users, often demanding settlements that far exceed any demonstrable market value of the works in question.

Revenue flows back to the law firm through risk-fee arrangements. The nominal plaintiff often has no employees, no office, and no business operations beyond filing lawsuits.

Professor Wang Yanfang of East China University of Political Science and Law and Xu Anbi, a senior attorney at Beijing Jiren Law Firm, documented this structure in a May 2026 analysis published in IP Economy. They described it as "litigation rights acquired for the sole purpose of initiating lawsuits," where "the works involved have a market value approaching zero, yet the plaintiff seeks to realize value through mass litigation."

The 2026 National People's Congress and Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference sessions brought the issue to a wider audience. Professor Ma Yide reported that in cities with active digital content ecosystems, a single rights holder or litigation attorney was filing "hundreds of new cases per week."

The Legal Standard: What Counts as a "Direct Interest"?

Article 122 of China's Civil Procedure Law requires that a plaintiff have a "direct interest" in the dispute. The Supreme People's Court's reference case framework, articulated in the "Wang v. Credit Cooperative" case from the Hebei High Court (2023 Ji Min Zai No. 35), sets out two tests:

1. Is the plaintiff a party to the disputed legal relationship?

2. Does the plaintiff exercise management or control rights over the disputed civil rights?

If neither applies, the plaintiff lacks standing.

This framework has become the analytical backbone for courts willing to scrutinize mass litigation plaintiffs. Wang and Xu's analysis identifies three dimensions where typical commercial litigation plaintiffs fail:

● They are not a party to the copyright legal relationship. The original author and the platform that actually operates the work hold the substantive rights. The litigation shell company neither created nor commercialized the work.

● They exercise no management or control over the work. They don't decide how the work is used, who licenses it, or where it appears. Litigation rights are procedural, not substantive—they don't substitute for genuine commercial interests.

● They effectively perform copyright collective management without authorization. The Copyright Collective Management Regulations prohibit any entity other than officially designated collective management organizations from exercising collective rights administration. The Guangdong High Court made this finding in the "Shengying Company" case (2016 Yue Min Zhong No. 670), ruling that the plaintiff's authorization activities were substantively identical to collective management.

Three Judicial Approaches—and the One That's Winning

Chinese courts have not moved in lockstep. Wang and Xu identify three distinct approaches:

Approach 1: Strict scrutiny—dismiss at the threshold. Several provincial courts, including Hunan, Henan, and Guangdong, have issued guidance documents requiring substantive examination of plaintiff standing before proceeding to infringement analysis. The Guangzhou IP Court's "Working Guidelines for Responding to Commercial Rights Enforcement Litigation" is the most detailed, establishing specific criteria for identifying suspect cases at the filing stage.

Approach 2: Soft regulation through damages. The Supreme People's Court has taken a notable position here. In cases including (2022) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 2196 and (2022) Zui Gao Fa Min Zai No. 274, the Court confirmed infringement but either drastically reduced damages or denied compensation entirely, explicitly characterizing mass litigation as a profit model that "should not be advocated or encouraged."

Approach 3: Form-over-substance review. Many courts still accept authorization documents at face value and proceed directly to infringement analysis. This approach persists partly because Article 122's formal review threshold has historically been low, and partly because commercial litigation plaintiffs have become sophisticated at structuring authorization chains that appear compliant on paper.

The trend is clearly moving toward Approach 1. The Supreme People's Court's 2025 Work Report explicitly stated that the judiciary should "explore mechanisms for disclosing information about related cases and punish conduct that disrupts the order of innovation in the name of rights protection."

The Hunan High Court's Landmark Ruling

The most consequential case to date emerged from Hunan Province in 2024.

A law firm paid RMB 2.8 million to a copyright company for the litigation rights to 10 documentary films. The firm then filed 3,084 lawsuits nationwide in the company's name, with all litigation proceeds flowing to the law firm.

The Hunan High Court declared the underlying agreement void. The court found that the law firm was not providing legal services to protect a client's rights—it had purchased litigation rights outright and was operating as both the litigation financier and the sole beneficiary of any awards. The court characterized this as "strongly profit-driven" conduct that "causes non-rights holders to file mass lawsuits for profit, wasting limited litigation resources and undermining genuine IP protection."

This was the first time a Chinese court invalidated the contractual basis of a law firm-driven mass litigation program. The ruling attacks the business model at its root: if the contract transferring litigation rights is void, every lawsuit built on that contract lacks standing.

What This Means for Internet Platforms

Platforms operating in China—e-commerce marketplaces, content aggregators, social media services, app stores—have been the primary targets of copyright mass litigation. The changing judicial landscape affects them in several ways.

The notice-and-takedown system remains the key pressure point. Under the 2006 Regulations on the Protection of Information Network Dissemination Rights, a valid takedown notice must include specific elements. Courts, however, have been inconsistent in applying these requirements. Wang and Xu note that some courts have treated notices containing only a work title and author pseudonym—without specific infringing URLs—as sufficient to trigger platform removal obligations, effectively converting the platform's passive response duty into an active content monitoring obligation.

The Supreme People's Court's September 2020 Guiding Opinions on platform liability established seven factors for evaluating whether a platform's response was adequate, including the preliminary evidence provided, the likelihood of infringement, and the effectiveness of the platform's actions. These factors give platforms grounds to push back against deficient notices, but only if they document their reasoning carefully.

Lower courts with lenient standing standards create "litigation sinks." When a court applies only formal review to plaintiff standing, it becomes a magnet for mass litigation filings. Platform operators have reported that commercial litigation plaintiffs deliberately concentrate cases in jurisdictions known for permissive review standards. The lack of a unified national standard on standing review means forum shopping remains a viable strategy.

Settlement pressure persists even when courts reduce damages. Even at Approach 2 courts that slash per-case awards, defendants often settle anyway. The reasoning is straightforward: a company facing a public infringement lawsuit—particularly one listed on a stock exchange or subject to regulatory scrutiny—may prefer a quiet settlement over a public judgment, regardless of the amount. Mass litigation plaintiffs understand this calculus well. Low per-case awards don't eliminate the settlement-driven profit model; they just change the ratio of court losses to settlement wins.

What Platform Operators Should Do

1. Challenge deficient takedown notices. If a notice lacks specific infringing URLs or fails to meet the statutory requirements under Article 14 of the Regulations on the Protection of Information Network Dissemination Rights, document the deficiency in writing and request specific information before taking action. The Supreme People's Court's framework gives platforms a basis to resist being railroaded by template notices.

2. Raise standing defenses early. When served with a copyright infringement complaint, examine the plaintiff's authorization chain. If the plaintiff is a shell company with no commercial operations, no history of using or licensing the works in question, and a litigation portfolio consisting entirely of enforcement actions, move to dismiss on standing grounds. Cite the Hunan High Court precedent and the Supreme People's Court's reference case framework.

3. Document everything. The East IP analysis of China's platform liability landscape emphasizes that "keeping good records of all communications, in a form readily notarized for evidentiary standards" is critical. This applies with equal force to interactions with commercial litigation plaintiffs. Every takedown notice received, every response sent, and every request for additional information should be preserved.

4. Resist the temptation to over-comply. Some platforms remove content on the basis of deficient notices out of an abundance of caution. While understandable, this practice feeds the commercial litigation ecosystem by demonstrating that threats produce results even without legal merit. Follow the statutory requirements, document your reasoning, and push back when notices fall short.

5. Monitor judicial developments in your operating jurisdictions. Provincial court guidance on commercial litigation standing is evolving rapidly. The Guangzhou IP Court's working guidelines, Hunan High Court's contract-voiding ruling, and the Supreme People's Court's increasingly explicit disapproval of mass litigation as a business model are all developments that platform operators should track and incorporate into their legal response strategies.

The Bigger Picture

China is not the only jurisdiction grappling with copyright trolls, but its approach is distinctive. Rather than legislating a solution—through statutory standing requirements or anti-troll provisions—Chinese courts are building a common law-style body of precedent through individual rulings. The result is a fragmented but increasingly coherent judicial doctrine that favors substantive rights holders over litigation entrepreneurs.

For foreign companies operating internet platforms or distributing content in China, the practical takeaway is straightforward: the courts are becoming less hospitable to copyright trolls, but the threat hasn't disappeared. Settlement economics still favor plaintiffs in many cases, and the absence of a unified national standard means enforcement will continue to vary by jurisdiction.

The companies that benefit most from this shift will be those that invest in understanding the specific standards applied in their operating jurisdictions, maintain meticulous records of all enforcement interactions, and are willing to challenge deficient claims rather than settling reflexively.

If your company is facing mass copyright enforcement in China or needs guidance on platform liability exposure, reach out to discuss how recent judicial developments affect your specific situation.