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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Chancery Division) Decisions >> Novo Nordisk A/S & Anor v British Telecommunications PLC & Ors [2026] EWHC 1094 (Ch) (13 May 2026) URL: https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2026/1094.html Cite as: [2026] EWHC 1094 (Ch) |
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BUSINESS AND PROPERTY COURTS OF ENGLAND AND WALES
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LIST (CHD)
Fetter Lane, London, EC4A 1NL |
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B e f o r e :
____________________
(1) NOVO NORDISK A/S(2) NOVO NORDISK LIMITED |
Claimants/ Applicants |
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| - and - |
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| (1) BRITISH TELECOMMUNICATIONS PLC (2) EE LIMITED (3) PLUSNET PLC (4) SKY UK LIMITED (5) TALKTALK TELECOM LIMITED (6) VIRGIN MEDIA LIMITED |
Defendants/ Respondents |
____________________
The Respondents ('the ISPs') did not appear but did not oppose the application
Hearing date: 2nd October 2025
____________________
Crown Copyright ©
Mr Justice Mellor :
Novo
Nordisk'
or 'NN') for a website blocking injunction directed at four target websites (1) Viogen Pharma (2) Pharma-Labs (3) Leo Labs and (4) The Steroid Supplier, together with any mirror or successor websites ('the Target Websites'). All 4 Target Websites are offering, selling and supplying counterfeit and unlicensed versions of
Novo
Nordisk's
semaglutide and other prescription-only medicines to UK consumers.
Novo
Nordisk diabetes and anti-obesity medications, marketed under NN registered trade marks for OZEMPIC, RYBELSUS and WEGOVY. It is a receptor agonist for glucagon-like peptide 1 ('GLP-1') which regulates blood sugar levels. Injecting a GLP-1 inhibitor such as semaglutide leads to reduced appetite (with associated beneficial effects such as weight loss) and is indicated for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. NN also market another GLP-1 agonist, liraglutide, under registered trade marks for VICTOZA and SAXENDA. I refer to all these trade marks as 'the NN Marks'.
i) Outright counterfeits labelled OZEMPIC or as one of the other NN brands;
ii) Third party manufactured versions of products containing semaglutide, liraglutide or cagrilintide which are unlicensed and marketed under their INN;
iii) Products which substitute a different substance or dosage altogether (e.g. insulin).
i) First, it is understood to be the first such application concerned with the supply of counterfeit and unlicensed prescription-only medicinal products.
ii) Second, the advertising and offering for sale of unlicensed prescription-only medicines is a criminal offence under the Human Medicine Regulations 2012 ('the Regulations').
i) The basis upon which NN has the right to enforce a breach of the Regulations or secure an injunction to prevent repeated offences under the Regulations.
ii) The nature of the right(s) which an applicant for a website blocking order must be able to assert.
i) First, that none of the Target Websites is authorised to market or sell any liraglutide-based medicinal product in the UK or EU.
ii) Second, that the only Target Website which sold liraglutide containing products was Pharma Labs but it was advertising and selling apparent counterfeit VICTOZA and SAXENDA, using NN-branded packaging and NN Marks.
iii) Third, the other Target Websites have been re-checked to see whether any were currently selling any liraglutide products. Mr Kelly confirmed that none appear to do so.
Applicable Legal Principles
Website blocking injunctions
i) First, the threshold requirements for an order are broadly the same as those applicable to s 97A, save that it is not limited to copyright infringement: Cartier CA at [80] (Kitchin LJ):
"First, the ISPs must be intermediaries within the meaning of the third sentence of Article 11. Secondly, either the users or the operators of the website must be infringing the claimant's trade marks. Thirdly, the users or the operators of the website must use the services of the ISPs. Fourthly, the ISPs must have actual knowledge of this."
ii) Second, the underlying principle is not limited to intellectual property rights and instead derives from the equitable protective jurisdiction, by which courts of equity may order a facilitator (such as an ISP) to take steps to prevent the commission of a legal wrong by a third party with which they are unwittingly mixed up. It is now settled law that this is a "principled basis" for exercising the Court's inherent power to grant injunctive relief against a party over whom it has in personam jurisdiction. As Lord Sumption JSC observed in Cartier SC at [15]:
"Website blocking orders clearly require more than the mere disclosure of information. But I think that it is clear from the authorities and correct in principle that orders for the disclosure of information are only one, admittedly common, category of order which a court may make against a third party to prevent the use of his facilities to commit or facilitate a wrong. I therefore agree … that the website blocking order made in this case could have been made … on ordinary principles of equity."
Subsequent authorities have expressed this as "settled" law: see Convoy Collateral Ltd v Broad Idea International Ltd [2021] UKPC 24 (Lord Leggatt JSC) (Lord Briggs, Lord Sales and Lord Hamblen JJSC agreeing) at [52]-[58] per Lord Leggatt JSC; an analysis described by Baker LJ (Phillips and Nugee LJJ agreeing) as "compelling and unanswerable": In re G [2023] Fam 107 at [61]. See also Bacci v Green [2023] Ch 201 at [50]-[52] (Arnold LJ).
iii) Third, it follows from this that although Cartier concerned trade mark infringement, any form of civil or criminal wrongdoing will suffice: see Nintendo [No 2] at [27] (Joanna Smith J) (and in Nintendo [No 1] Arnold J accepted that the Court had jurisdiction on the basis of contraventions of ss 296ZD and 296 CDPA 1988). This is because the Court's jurisdiction is derived from ordinary principles of equity, in which there is no relevant distinction between being mixed up in a civil or a criminal wrong: see Ashworth Hospital Authority v MGN Ltd [2002] UKHL 29; [2002] 1 WLR 2033 at [53]-[60] (Lord Woolf CJ) (Lord Browne-Wilkinson, Lord Nolan and Lord Hobhouse agreeing). In Ashworth, jurisdiction was confirmed to extend to someone who was "involved, whether innocently or otherwise, in the wrongdoing which would in these circumstances be criminal": at [58]. See also the observation of Lord Slynn (agreeing) that "the jurisdiction recognised in [Norwich Pharmacal] … does not depend on whether the person against whom the order is sought has committed a tort, a breach of contract or other civil or criminal wrong", provided that they have "been 'involved'" in some way in the wrongdoing.
iv) Fourth, where the services of the ISPs allow UK consumers to access the Target Websites and thereby receive infringing advertisements and offers for sale, and conclude agreements to buy counterfeit goods, that involves relevant and sufficient use of the ISPs' services to engage the Court's jurisdiction: see Cartier CA at [95] (Kitchin LJ). The ISPs are "essential actors in all of the communications between the consumers and the operators of the target websites": ibid. The same logic must apply where such advertisements, offers for sale and sales are unlawful.
v) Fifth, in determining whether to exercise its jurisdiction to make a website blocking order, the Court must consider whether the order is proportionate, including having regard to the principles endorsed by Kitchin LJ in Cartier CA at [100]–[101]. In Nintendo [No 1] at [41], Arnold J summarised the relevant considerations as follows:
"The injunction must be (i) necessary, (ii) effective, (iii) dissuasive, (iv) not unduly costly or complicated, (v) avoid barriers to legitimate trade, (vi) a fair balance between the fundamental rights engaged, (vii) proportionate and (viii) safeguarded against abuse. Of these factors, proportionality is the key one, since consideration of the other factors feeds into the proportionality analysis."
vi) Sixth, in considering the overall question of proportionality, the Court is required to embark on a cost-benefit analysis, having regard to the benefits likely to be obtained by blocking, and any adverse consequences, e.g. the risk of "over-blocking" legitimate content: Cartier CA at [177].
vii) Seventh, in order to ensure that orders are proportionate (both as between the parties and as regards third parties who may be affected by the order), it is appropriate to include safeguards, such as a sunset clause and obligations to notify affected website operators, so that any problems that do arise may be brought to the parties' and, if necessary, the Court's attention.
The Court's power to grant injunctions
'26. It was common ground that an injunction is an equitable remedy albeit it has a statutory basis in s.37(1) of the Senior Courts Act.
27. It was also common ground that the relevant basic principles governing the modern approach to injunctions were recently reviewed and enunciated by the Supreme Court in Wolverhampton City Council v London Gypsies and Travellers [2024] 2 WLR 45) and that in that case, the Supreme Court adopted key aspects from the Privy Council decision in Convoy Collateral Ltd v Broad Idea International Ltd [2023] AC 389.
i) The power to grant injunctions stated in s.37(1) merely confirms and restates the power of the courts to grant injunctions which existed before the Supreme Court of Judicature Act 1873 and still exists (Wolverhampton, [17]).
ii) It is necessary to distinguish between two senses of the word "jurisdiction": the power to grant an injunction and the principles and practice governing the exercise of that power. The former is the only really correct sense of the expression (Wolverhampton, [16]). The power of the courts with equitable jurisdiction to grant injunctions is, subject to any relevant statutory restrictions, unlimited. (Wolverhampton, [17]). As a court of inherent jurisdiction, the High Court possesses the power, and bears the responsibility, to act so as to maintain the rule of law (Wolverhampton, [18]).
iii) Like any judicial power, the power to grant an injunction must be exercised in accordance with principle and any restrictions established by judicial precedent and rules of court (Wolverhampton, [19]). Nevertheless, the principles and practice governing the exercise of the power to grant injunctions need to and do evolve over time as circumstances change (Wolverhampton, [19]-[20]).
iv) The width and flexibility of the equitable jurisdiction to issue injunctions are not to be cut down by categorisations based on previous practice (Wolverhampton, [21]). That is not to undermine the importance of precedent, or to suggest that established categories of injunction are unimportant. However, injunctions may be issued in new circumstances when the principles underlying the existing law so require (Wolverhampton, [22]).
v) The exercise of the jurisdiction must be principled, but the criterion is injustice. Injustice is to be viewed and decided in the light of today's conditions and standards, not those of yester-year (Wolverhampton, [21], quoting the "illuminating albeit dissenting" judgment of Lord Nicholls in Mercedes Benz AG v Leiduck [1996] AC 284, at 308).
28. Accordingly, the Court does have the jurisdiction (in the true sense of the word) to grant the relief COPA seeks. As explained below, the decision of HHJ Birss QC in Samsung v Apple [2012] EWHC 2049 showed that he regarded injunctive relief sought by Samsung, which was in some ways similar to that sought in the present case and was also ancillary to a declaration of non-infringement, to be capable of being granted (though on the facts he did not do so).
29. Returning to Wolverhampton, the Supreme Court also discussed the wide range of forms of injunctive relief the English courts had previously developed, all in pursuit of the overriding goal of doing justice: see in particular [20]. These are relevant to this case, as the injunctive relief now sought by COPA bears similarities to a number of existing types of injunction which are routinely granted by English Courts.
30. The Supreme Court identified some novel categories of injunction that have been developed by the courts. Those include:
i) Injunctions against non-parties, including injunctions contra mundum to protect human rights (Wolverhampton, [23]-[42]).
ii) Injunctions in the absence of a cause of action ("It is now well established that the grant of injunctive relief is not always conditional on the existence of a cause of action." (Wolverhampton, [43]-[49])). Examples of these include: relator and ex officio actions by the Attorney General; the freezing injunction; the Norwich Pharmacal order; the Banker's Trust order; internet blocking orders. One might also add cases in which local authorities obtain injunctions to preclude criminal conduct such as unlawful trading where the criminal sanctions are insufficient to deter the (usually profitable) conduct.
31. The question before the Supreme Court in Wolverhampton was whether the court should grant a so-called "newcomer" injunction, restraining not only present, unidentified travellers who were acting or threatening to act unlawfully, but also unknown persons who might (or might not) form that intention, or so act, in the future. The Supreme Court described this as "a wholly new type of injunction with no very closely related ancestor from which it might be described as evolutionary offspring", although analogies could be drawn with some established forms of order (Wolverhampton [144]).
32. The Supreme Court held that such an injunction could be granted based upon first principles. In summary, it reasoned as follows:
i) The principles upon which injunctions are granted or withheld remain equitable. Those principles also generally provide the answer to the question whether settled principles or practice about the general limits or conditions within which injunctions are granted may properly be adjusted over time (Wolverhampton [146]).
ii) A well-known passage in Spry on Equitable Remedies regarding the readiness of equity to change and adapt its principles for the grant of equitable relief "has come to be embedded in English law" (Wolverhampton [147], [148]).
iii) The basic general principle by reference to which equity provides a discretionary remedy is that it intervenes to put right defects or inadequacies in the common law. One example is where available common law remedies are inadequate to protect or enforce the claimant's rights (Wolverhampton [149], [150]). The other example given by the Supreme Court was that of conscience-based remedies, such as rectification, undue influence and equitable estoppel.
iv) Equity looks to the substance rather than the form. In Wolverhampton, that meant not being confined by the twin silos of interim and final injunctions, and being able to assess the most suitable means of enabling newcomers to have a proper opportunity to be heard (Wolverhampton [151]).
v) Equity is flexible, thus enabling the precise form of injunctions and their terms and conditions to be developed over time and to meet the justice of particular cases (Wolverhampton [52]).
vi) There is no sacrosanct limiting rule or principle apart from justice and convenience. The best illustration of this is the supposed Siskina limiting principle that an injunction could only be granted in, or as ancillary to, proceedings for substantive relief in respect of a cause of action in the same jurisdiction – now expressly rejected in Broad Idea (see below) (Wolverhampton [153]).
vii) There was therefore no immovable obstacle in the way of granting newcomer injunctions.
33. The Privy Council in Convoy Collateral held that the granting of injunctive relief extends beyond the protection of legal or equitable rights of the applicant, referring instead to the protection of legitimate "interests":
"The proposition asserted by Lord Diplock in The Siskina and Bremer Vulkan on the authority of North London Railway was that an injunction may only be granted to protect a legal or equitable right. There can be no objection to this proposition in so far as it signifies the need to identify an interest of the claimant which merits protection and a legal or equitable principle which justifies exercising the power to grant an injunction to protect that interest by ordering the defendant to do or refrain from doing something. … within a very short time after The Siskina was decided, it had already become clear that the proposition cannot be maintained if it is taken to mean that an injunction may only be granted to protect a right which can be identified independently of the reasons which justify the grant of an injunction." (Convoy Collateral at [52].)
34. That view was endorsed by the Court of Appeal in Re G (Court of Protection: Injunction) [2022] EWCA Civ 1312 at [61], [69] and [71]. The Court of Appeal expressly endorsed the "interest of the claimant" formulation, and indeed expanded it to "the interest of the person protected by the injunction" so as to include a third party for whose benefit the original orders were made and which the defendant sought to frustrate.
'45. Judicial comment over the years has repeatedly recognised that new situations may call for new forms of injunction. The overarching principle is that stated by Kitchin LJ in Cartier International AG v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd [2017] Bus LR 1 at [46], echoing Lord Goff in South Carolina Insurance Co [1987] AC 24 at 44. The courts will "adapt to new circumstances by developing their practice in relation to the grant of injunctions where it is necessary and appropriate to do so to avoid injustice." This view was endorsed by the Privy Council in Convoy Collateral at [56], then by the Supreme Court in Wolverhampton at [21] and [22]. Changing circumstances include those resulting from developments in information technology and globalisation. (Convoy Collateral [59], [60]).
46. In Cartier itself, the Court upheld the decision to make website blocking injunctions to prevent infringement of intellectual property rights, starting from the domestic law propositions that (i) injunctions could be granted against those who had not themselves infringed rights, if they would protect such rights; (ii) an analogy could be drawn with the equitable protective principle underlying Norwich Pharmacal orders; and (iii) the Court's jurisdiction under s.37(1) was very broad and could "be exercised in new ways": see [55]-[56].'
The Wrongdoing relied upon
i) Are those of the holder of a valid UK marketing authorisation, when they are not; or
ii) Are those of NN itself; and/or
iii) Are linked in the course of trade with NN, as the holder of the only MA for semaglutide permitting such medicines to be sold (e.g. under licence from NN).
i) As a description of equivalence with NN's genuine semaglutide or liraglutide medicines, when the unlicensed product is not in truth equivalent because (1) has not been made by the holder of a valid marketing authorisation, does not comply with UK medicines regulations (as to which see below) and therefore is not legally licensed semaglutide or liraglutide; and (2) does not have the same chemical impurity composition as the genuine product;
ii) As a claim to be members of the class of traders entitled to manufacture and sell semaglutide and liraglutide-containing medicines – a class which is, for now, limited to a single entity (NN); and
iii) Because, as matters stand, the indicium semaglutide, in relation to a regulated medicinal product, can only refer to NN and must therefore be distinctive of it in trade; and
iv) Because, again as matters stand, the indicium liraglutide refers to the class of traders entitled to manufacture and sell liraglutide pursuant to a valid MA, and none of the Target Websites qualify.
Wrongdoing under the Regulations and the attempts to stop it
i) Contrary to regulation 46, each such website is selling, supplying and/or offering to sell or supply, an unauthorised medicinal product, namely 'lookalike' semaglutide which has been synthesised by a third party (e.g. Viogen, Leo Lab) or products which have not been granted a marketing authorisation at all (e.g. CagriSema);
ii) Contrary to regulations 214 and 220, each website is selling or supplying a prescription-only medicine otherwise than in accordance with a valid prescription;
iii) Contrary to regulations 17, 18 and 44(5), each website is importing, selling, supplying and/or offering for sale or supply, prescription-only medicines without being authorised to dispense such medicines as they are not GPhC-registered pharmacies or licensed wholesalers/manufacturers; and
iv) Contrary to regulations 279 and 284, each website is publishing an advertisement for a medicinal product for which no marketing authorisation or other relevant authorisation is in force (in the case of cagrilintide-containing products) or in circumstances likely to lead to the use of a prescription only medicine.
The MHRA
Some additional points
i) Falsified products may not have been manufactured to the same laboratory standards of quality control as those manufactured by NN, with resulting impurities, the presence of allergens, or differences in concentration. All the sample products purchased from the Target Websites show that they contain impurities.
ii) NN has given evidence to a US Senate Committee which identifies from US FDA data over 300 serious health issues, 100 hospitalisations and 10 deaths in the US that have been linked to the use of falsified semaglutide products, a phenomenon which cannot be confined to the US. The WHO has warned that substandard and falsified products sold online may cause as many as 1 million excess deaths annually, and that 50 per cent of medicines sold online are not genuine.
iii) The extent of the problem is such that the European Medicines Agency, MHRA and other national regulators have issued repeated warnings about unlicensed counterfeit versions of semaglutide and liraglutide; in Austria, adverse patient reactions and hospitalisations have also been reported.
iv) Any adverse reactions to unlicensed semaglutide risk contaminating NN's pharmacovigilance system by wrongly attributing those events to NN's products.
i) The Guardian has reported on hospitalisations for "serious side effects ranging from hypoglycaemic shock to coma" and seizures of hundreds of Ozempic and Saxenda injector pens obtained through "non-legitimate routes, such as unregulated websites";
ii) The Independent has warned of fake pens filled with insulin and noted the role of organised crime in circulating counterfeit medicine;
iii) The Daily Mail has reported on seizures of fake injector pens "found to contain rat poison, cement, mercury and arsenic", "too little of the active ingredient, or none at all" and the MHRA's observation that falsified Ozempic is "flooding the online market";
iv) The Telegraph has covered specific risks to teenagers "lying about their weight to obtain the injections from online pharmacies" and fake batches of Ozempic; and
v) LBC reports the MHRA's assessment that "people have suffered 'tremendous harm' as a result of taking counterfeit goods bought on the black market", citing the example of a 24-year-old healthcare worker who was hospitalised after injecting fake Ozempic she bought online.
Jurisdiction to grant the Order Sought
i) First, it was clear that the Respondent ISPs are clearly service providers within the meaning of regulation 2 of the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 (SI 2002/2013).
ii) Second and Third, the services of the Respondent ISPs and each of them have been used to infringe the NN Marks, commit passing off, and commit serious violations of the 2012 Regulations.
iii) Fourth, the ISPs have actual knowledge of the infringing use of their services, at least through service of the evidence filed in support of the application.
Proportionality and Discretion
i) The Target Websites advertise and sell illegal, unlicensed and counterfeit medicines; they "are profiting from infringement on an industrial scale" (as in EMI at [107]); their operators have no legitimate interest in making available such material, for profit, at the expense of right-holders and the public – the more so where their falsified products pose substantial risks to public health.
ii) There is a real and pressing need for ongoing remedies of this kind, given the wider commercial and public health context of counterfeiting of semaglutide products (see above). Blocking will protect the public from dangerous medicinal products and assist in protecting the value of NN's rights and its considerable investment in developing and promoting useful medicines.
iii) The order sought is therefore necessary both to protect the public and to prevent infringements of NN's intellectual property rights, which the Target Websites are infringing on a large scale.
iv) Blocking is likely to be highly effective to reduce the level of access by UK consumers to the Target Websites. This is consistent with the experience of other right-holders in the previous cases cited above, which indicate average reductions of UK visitors of 98%, notwithstanding attempts to circumvent those orders: see Capitol Records at [79]. There is therefore every reason to suppose that the order sought will have a material impact on the public's ability to obtain unlawful medicines from four popular sources.
v) 'Over-blocking' is not a material risk here, as an extensive review has identified no lawful products being advertised and sold on any Target Website (again, see above); it is highly unlikely that there will be any significant attempt to sell lawful products in the future (see Capitol Records at [77]). The risk of interfering with legitimate commercial activity is therefore negligible.
vi) NN has attempted to engage with the operators of the Target Websites to secure their removal, including by sending take-down notices and engaging with the MHRA, who even with its remedial armoury as the UK medicines regulator has similarly been unsuccessful in removing these websites and the threat they pose to the UK public. None of these steps has been effective, in large part because the websites are operated anonymously and use hosts and other service providers located abroad.
vii) Even if the websites were temporarily taken offline (as appeared to have happened with Pharma Labs), in the longer term this is likely to lead to a game of "whack a mole" as the sites move to mirror or replacement locations, and resume operation. This can only be avoided with a more dynamic and responsive remedy like website blocking.
viii) The proposed order is narrow and targeted, being limited to the specified URLs and domain names of the Target Websites, and any successor or mirror sites thereto. There is no material risk of "over-blocking" lawful content or trade.
ix) The draft order includes substantially the same safeguards as previous orders, including notification provisions, liberty to apply to the Target Website operator and anyone affected by the order, as well as the Cartier safeguards (e.g. a sunset clause of 2 years).
x) The ISPs do not oppose the order, which can be implemented using their existing systems; it can therefore be taken to be proportionate as between the parties (as in Capitol Records at [73]).
xi) The costs of implementation to the ISPs will be "modest and proportionate" (EMI at [107]) and will be met by the Applicants in accordance with the principles in Cartier SC.
Postscript