01
Factual background & dispute
- Videos featuring the claimant, Liao, were made into paid face-swap templates.
- The service replaced facial features while retaining the original bodies, movements, styling, and scenes.
- The operator argued that its video sources were lawful and a third party supplied the face-swap technology.
02
Core issues & judicial focus
- Whether a video remains identifiable as the claimant after the face is replaced
- Whether producing a face-swap template processes facial and other personal information
- Whether reliance on third-party technology removes the operator's responsibility
03
Judicial finding & holding
- On the facts of this case, the altered videos and their context no longer identified the claimant, so the court did not find infringement of portrait rights.
- The court nevertheless found unauthorized processing of the claimant’s facial information.
- The operator was ordered to bear civil liability. Face replacement does not categorically exclude infringement of portrait rights.
04
Practical risk implications
01Face-swap products should assess copyright, portrait rights, and the legal basis for personal information processing separately.
02Using a third-party algorithm does not remove an operator's duty to review material provenance and processing purposes.
03Template ingestion, feature extraction, generation, and distribution require authorization and deletion mechanisms.