High Court of Australia, University of New South Wales v. Moorhouse [1975] HCA 26; (1975) 133 CLR 1

The University of New South Wales was found liable for authorising the infringements of those who used the photocopiers it provided in its library. The case was brought as a test case, with plaintiffs alleging that UNSW was liable for making the photocopy machines available within its library without supervision and without appropriate notices about copyright rules. The High Court held that “authorise” in s 36(1) of the Copyright Act 1968 means “sanction, approve, countenance”. Two approaches to evaluating authorisation liability emerged from the case. Justice Gibbs stated the test which would later be codified in ss 36(1A) and 101(1A): “It seems to me... that a person who has under his control the means by which an infringement of copyright may be committed – such as a photocopying machine – and who makes it available to other persons, knowing, or having reason to suspect, that it is likely to be used for the purpose of committing an infringement, and omitting to take reasonable steps to limit its use to legitimate purposes, would authorize any infringement that resulted from its use.” Justice Jacobs, with whom McTiernan ACJ agreed, instead focused on the implied invitation given by UNSW to library users to make use of the photocopying machines as they saw fit. By making this invitation without any limitations, UNSW had implicitly authorised any infringements that might result.