On November 12, "Zhao Liying sues Hongguo Short Drama" trended on social media.
"Zhao Liying sues Hongguo Short Drama" climbed to second place on the entertainment trending list. According to public information from Qichacha, actress Zhao Liying filed a portrait rights dispute lawsuit against Beijing Bimo Liuxiang Technology Co., Ltd., the operator of Hongguo Short Drama, its wholly-owned shareholder Beijing Douyin Information Service Co., Ltd., and a natural person named Shi Moulun, with the Beijing Mentougou District People's Court. The case held its first hearing via cloud court on November 10 and has not yet been ruled upon.
Zhao Liying's side claims that certain short dramas on the Hongguo Short Drama platform allegedly used AI face-swapping and face-merging technology to synthesize her facial features onto characters without permission, and even directly used her portrait as short drama covers for commercial traffic generation. In other words, the core of the dispute is not the traditional unauthorized use of photographs, but whether a face synthesized by AI can legally be recognized as Zhao Liying's portrait.
This is not the first time Hongguo Short Drama has been embroiled in similar controversies. Public reports show that the portraits of actors including Jackson Yee, Deng Wei, Yang Zi, Xiao Zhan, and Cheng Yi had previously been used by AI short dramas on the platform through AI face-swapping or synthesis. Related disputes erupted intensively between March and April 2026, during which multiple artist studios issued rights protection statements in quick succession.
Hongguo Short Drama released a special governance announcement on April 6, 2026, stating that it had completed a comprehensive review of 15,000 works and handled 670 violating works in accordance with regulations (the announcement also disclosed that a total of 1,718 violating animated dramas were removed in the first quarter). Platform customer service previously responded that "AI short dramas are a new type, so there may be imperfections in the review process."
Regarding the division of platform responsibility and the determination of whether AI-synthesized faces infringe on portrait rights, reporters interviewed two lawyers specializing in intellectual property.
The two ByteDance entities do not bear the same responsibility
Zhao Liying listed both the operator of Hongguo Short Drama and Douyin Information Service Company as defendants. How responsibility is divided among entities within the ByteDance system is the first layer of contention in this case.
You Yunting, a senior partner at Shanghai Dabang Law Firm, pointed out that ByteDance involves two entities in this case, and their legal statuses are not the same. "Hongguo is the broadcasting platform for short dramas. They cannot invoke the safe harbor principle because short drama platforms can only go online after their own review, so their duty of care is relatively high." The lawyer analyzed that the core of the safe harbor principle is that a platform can be exempted from liability if it promptly deletes infringing content after receiving a notice of infringement, but the premise for applying this principle is that the platform does not bear a prior review obligation for the content. As the entity responsible for reviewing and launching short dramas, Hongguo Short Drama has an active gatekeeping duty for content that goes online, and its duty of care is higher than that of general information storage space service providers. Therefore, it is difficult for it to invoke the safe harbor principle to cut off its own liability.
"But Douyin is not necessarily the same. Douyin is indeed a platform for broadcasting short dramas, but I think Douyin can still enter the safe harbor. Their legal obligation is to delete relevant content after receiving a notice of infringement. If they fail to delete it, then they bear liability," the lawyer said.
Zhang Shuqing, a lawyer at Shanghai Jinmao Law Firm, judged that general platforms apply the rules of "notice and takedown" and "should have known," for example, if the rights holder has already reported or complained to the platform, or if the video is well-known and has high dissemination on the platform, the infringement facts are obvious and the platform has failed to take necessary measures. Platforms that broadcast micro short dramas, however, may be required to have higher pre-broadcast verification and review responsibilities based on their specific business type. In this case, if the video is determined to constitute infringement, then for the platform, it is still necessary to specifically analyze the boundaries of its review responsibility, duty of care, and post-hoc handling responsibility. In addition, if infringing videos are further amplified through platform algorithm recommendations, the platform may also bear responsibility for this.
Does a synthesized face count as a "portrait"? The key lies in recognizability
Compared with the layering of platform responsibility, lawyers believe the more core dispute in this case is whether an AI-synthesized face constitutes an infringement of Zhao Liying's portrait rights. Lawyers believe the more core dispute in this case is whether an AI-synthesized face constitutes an infringement of Zhao Liying's portrait rights. Image source: internet.
According to Article 1018, Paragraph 2 of the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Civil Code), "a portrait is the external image of a specific natural person reflected on a certain carrier through images, sculptures, paintings, etc., that can be recognized." According to Article 1019 of the Civil Code, acts infringing portrait rights include "defacing,污损, or using information technology to forge another person's portrait," as well as "producing, using, or publicly disclosing a portrait rights holder's portrait without their consent."
Portraits have the characteristics of individuality and recognizability, and should point to a specific individual image that distinguishes a natural person from other natural persons. Even if the image used in an AI short drama is not exactly identical to the person and is a synthesized face, it is not automatically excluded from portrait rights protection. The key judgment is not "whether it is exactly the same," but the recognizability of the portrait.
You Yunting pointed out, "If it can be recognized by the general public or a specific industry group, it should be determined that the natural person's portrait has been used. At this time, what is judged is whether, from facial contours and facial features, the general public thinks it looks particularly like the person. If the public perception answer is 'yes,' then the court will most likely rule infringement."
As for how "public perception" can be implemented at the evidentiary level, the lawyer said, "You can find an appraisal agency to conduct an appraisal. If it really looks particularly alike, then the court does not even need an appraisal and can directly make a determination."
No matter when the judgment is handed down, this case will directly answer a question that the AI short drama industry is repeatedly testing: whether AI-synthesized faces can be recognized as portraits protected by law, and how much responsibility platforms should bear in the dissemination of such content. The reason Zhao Liying's lawsuit goes beyond the significance of an individual case is precisely that it hands these two unresolved questions in the AI short drama industry to the court, awaiting an answer that can be cited in future cases.
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