America's top judges decide copied code in Android is fair use Share Copy The US Supreme Court on Monday ruled in a 6-2 decision that Google's limited copying of Oracle's Java APIs in its Android operating system constitutes fair use under US law. The ruling puts an end to a case that troubled the software industry for more than a decade and narrows the scope of copyright law as it applies to software. The court had two questions before it: whether software interfaces qualify for copyright protection and whether Google's use of Oracle's software interface code represents fair use, assuming the Java APIs can be copyrighted.