Ofra Became Big Social Media Beauty Brand at Sony Music’s ‘Expense,’ Says Complaint
Ten or more John Doe owners, operators and employees built Ofra Cosmetics “into one of the most successful and influential beauty brands on social media” but did so “through blatant, willful, and repeated copyright infringement of the sound recordings and…
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musical compositions of various content owners,” alleged Sony Music and seven of its affiliated labels in a complaint Tuesday (docket 0:23-cv-62073) in U.S. District Court for Southern Florida in Fort Lauderdale. The complaint estimates that Ofra has amassed more than 1.7 million followers on Instagram alone. Its social media pages are “populated with videos” showcasing Ofra’s branded makeup and beauty products, “alongside popular copyrighted sound recordings and musical compositions,” said the complaint. In doing so, Ofra “regularly exploits,” or “materially contributes to the exploitation,” of videos “that contain unlicensed sound recordings and musical compositions owned by record and music publishing companies,” the complaint said. It estimates that Ofra has posted at least 329 videos to its own social media pages featuring the plaintiffs’ sound recordings without their authorization. The videos are ads, and the Sony Music sound recordings are used to enhance their “commercial impact,” the plaintiffs said. Sony Music informed Ofra of its infringing use of the copyrighted material by letter in September 2022, but the company has refused “to meaningfully engage in any discussions” about stopping the infringing conduct, said the complaint. That conduct “has caused and continues to cause substantial and irreparable harm to Sony Music,” while enriching Ofra at the "expense" of Sony Music, its labels and its artists, it said. The complaint seeks to hold Ofra responsible for its substantial, willful, direct and secondary copyright infringement, the “full extent” of which is “presently unknown,” it said. The plaintiffs are presently unaware of the "true names and/or the involvement" of the defendants sued by the fictitious John Doe designations, and for that reason they sue them by those designations, said the complaint. The plaintiffs "will seek leave to amend this pleading to identify those defendants when their true names and involvement in the infringements and other wrongful conduct hereinafter described are known," it said.