Modern digital marketplaces run on processes and systems that are invisible to consumers. This is especially true for advertising mechanisms run by search engines like Google, which rely on algorithms and real-time auctions to run their advertising services. These backend processes can create friction between existing laws governing advertising, brand protection and intermediary liability and newly evolving technologies that bend and question their applicability. The Delhi High Court’s judgment in Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd sits precisely at this fault line.[1] Although this judgment extensively addresses trademark “use,” its broader significance lies in its treatment of intermediary safe harbour under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (“IT Act”).
Case Background
Google’s AdWords programme allows advertisers to bid on keywords that trigger a sponsored advertisement whenever a user searches that particular term. The winning bid is decided not only by price but by an aggregate “Quality Score” which also takes into account the relevance of the advertisement. Google earns revenue each time the advertisement is clicked.[2] Hindware Ltd, the proprietor of the registered and well-known mark “HINDWARE,” discovered that Google was permitting its direct competitors like Grohe India and Cera to bid on “HINDWARE” itself as a keyword, so that a search for Hindware’s products would surface rival advertisements above Hindware’s own listing. Grohe and Cera settled, leaving Google LLC and Google India as the sole contesting defendants in two connected suits. The central questions before the Court were whether Google’s conduct amounted to “use” of the mark under the Trade Marks Act, 1999, and, separately, whether Google could shelter behind the intermediary safe harbour in Section 79 of the IT Act.[3]
The Trademark Question
The Court held that Section 29(6) of the Trade Marks Act defines “use” broadly enough to capture a backend keyword trigger, focusing on the commercial function performed by a mark rather than its visibility on screen.[4] Furthermore, it held that Google’s monetisation of Hindware’s goodwill without consideration constituted unfair advantage of a well-known, coined mark under Section 29(8).[5] The Court built on the Division Bench’s earlier findings in Google LLC v DRS Logistics (P) Ltd,[6] while distinguishing it from Google LLC v MakeMyTrip (India) Pvt Ltd,[7] wherein it was held that a mark that was a conjugation of generic words could be bid for as a keyword.
The Intermediary Question
The more significant part of the judgment pertains to Section 79 of the IT Act. Google argued that it is an “intermediary” under Section 2(1)(w) of the IT Act, that the advertisement and the keyword are both third-party data supplied by the advertiser, and that Google’s Keyword Planner Tool is merely an optional research aid that does not exempt it from the safe harbour protection.[8]
Section 79(1) exempts an intermediary from liability for third-party information it merely hosts or makes available, but this exemption is conditional. Section 79(2) sets out conditions that an intermediary must satisfy to claim the exemption under Section 79(1). These include conditions concerning initiation of transmission, selection of the receiver, selection or modification of information, and compliance with applicable due diligence requirements.[9] Section 79(3) additionally removes the protection where the intermediary has “conspired, abetted, aided or induced” the unlawful act.[10]
Applying this reasoning, the Court found that Google’s Keyword Planner Tool actively suggests trademarked terms to advertisers, and that the AdWords architecture is designed to transmit advertisements to the specific class of users searching for that trademark. On the facts and operation of Google’s AdWords system before it, the Court concluded that Google selected the receiver of the transmission within the meaning of Section 79(2)(b).[11]
On the matter of due diligence, the judgment also considered the intermediary’s due-diligence obligations under the applicable intermediary framework and examined Google’s approach to trademark complaints concerning keyword advertising. The Court found that Google’s post-2004 policy change under which it declined to investigate trademark complaints arising from keyword bidding was itself a failure of that due diligence.[12] Finally, the Court held that Google is not a passive intermediary but runs an advertising business, of which it has pervasive control, and that this active, revenue-driven participation brought Section 79(3) into play, forfeiting the safe harbour altogether.
Analysis and Critical Observations
Although this judgment is doctrinally important and sets a good base for future judgments to build upon, it leaves a few gaps that limit its applicability.
Firstly, the judgment heavily relies on Hindware’s status as a well-known mark. It distinguishes the present factual matrix from the MakeMyTrip case by saying that a generic or descriptive mark carries a lower likelihood of confusion and could therefore continue to be used as a keyword.[13] This leaves unprotected a vast majority of Indian brands that are not “well-known” in the statutory sense, although they would face the same diversion of consumer traffic at the hands of the same auction mechanism. The judgment therefore protects strong marks well while doing little for ordinary registered proprietors, or even small businesses who arguably need the safeguard just as much, if not more, to prevent diversion of traffic to more powerful competitors who have the resources to bid actively in real-time keyword auctions.
Secondly, the Section 79 analysis, although correctly expanding intermediary liability, again suffers from the same flaw of remaining fact-specific. The Court reaches its result by finding that Google, acting through its AdWords architecture, wherein it plays an active role in deciding who the advertisement reaches, fails the Section 79(2)(b) selection test. It does not, however, offer a broader test of what constitutes “selecting” a recipient, and how it would apply to other algorithmic tools or real-time auction mechanisms. As search engines, marketplaces, and social platforms increasingly deploy recommendation algorithms for far more than advertising, this narrower, transaction-specific finding may not travel well to the next generation of disputes.
On similar lines, by restricting its interpretation to merely the “selection” of the transmission test, the judgment leaves unaddressed the larger informational infrastructure that targeted advertising relies on in the first place. Google’s Privacy Policy discloses that it uses search terms and aggregated data on activity across its platforms to help advertisers understand the effectiveness of their advertising campaigns.[14] By evaluating the role played by Google as an intermediary against only the selection test, the Court fails to connect intermediary liability to the underlying data-driven advertisement targeting, which needs to be addressed by both brand protection and privacy law.
Lastly, the remedy of ₹30 lakh in nominal damages grossly undermines the force of the judgment. Such a sum has a negligible impact on Google’s advertising revenue, and has very poor value as a deterrent.[15] Such poor compensation to plaintiffs would allow powerful and well-reputed advertising platforms to get away with infringement and violation of laws, without truly having to evaluate or alter the behaviour of their platform.
Conclusion
Hindware v Google is a great step towards adapting existing trademark and intermediary liability laws towards information technology law in an economy that is becoming increasingly reliant on digital marketplaces. It appropriately holds that a search engine cannot claim the safe harbour shelter despite designing, running, profiting, and failing to address the flaws in a platform that is causing infringement. However, by anchoring its findings strongly to Google’s specific Keyword Planner architecture and to the well-known status of the mark in question, the court produces an outcome that remains weak in its applicability to future cases. What is required is a clearer, and more uniform standard that goes beyond asking whether a platform selects a receiver, but whether an intermediary’s underlying technology and usage of data, converts it from a host of third-party content into an active commercial participant undeserving of safe harbour.
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Author Credit
This article is authored by Aishwarya Yeramilli, a final-year B.B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student at Jindal Global Law School. Her interests lie in exploring intellectual property law at the intersection of technology and law.
References
[1] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
[2] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
[3] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
[4] Trade Marks Act 1999, s 29(6).
[5] Trade Marks Act 1999, s 29(8).
[6] Google LLC v DRS Logistics (P) Ltd, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 4809.
[7] Google LLC v MakeMyTrip (India) Pvt Ltd, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 7965.
[8] Information Technology Act 2000, s 2(1)(w).
[9] Information Technology Act 2000, s 79(1)–(2).
[10] Information Technology Act 2000, s 79(3).
[11] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
[12] Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021, r 3(1)(b)(iv).
[13] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
[14] Google, ‘Privacy Policy’ (Google, effective 26 May 2026), https://policies.google.com/privacy
[15] Hindware Ltd v Grohe India Pvt Ltd, 2026:DHC:4614 (Delhi High Court).
