By Islam El-Sakka
The owners of Elvis Presley's music catalog have filed a lawsuit against AI company Anthropic, alleging the firm used copyrighted lyrics to train its Claude language models without permission or compensation. The legal action claims the company has generated infringing versions of the legendary singer's songs through its AI technology.
Allegations of Mass Copyright Infringement
Authentic Brands Group, the licensing platform managing Presley’s intellectual property, joined other companies, trusts, and individuals in filing the lawsuit on Friday. The plaintiffs allege that Anthropic infringed upon the copyrights of 274 songs, including iconic hits such as “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” “Don’t Be Cruel,” “All Shook Up,” “A Little Less Conversation,” and “Return to Sender.”
The lawsuit asserts that the infringement occurred throughout the development of Anthropic's flagship Claude models and persists as users prompt the AI to produce outputs that reproduce copyrighted lyrics or create unauthorized adaptations. Plaintiffs claim that even when asked to recreate songs for a modern audience, the AI produces results that closely mimic the original structures, hooks, and verses of the protected works.
Legal Demands and Anthropic's Response
The plaintiffs are seeking $41.1 million in statutory copyright damages, calculated at up to $150,000 for each of the 274 works allegedly willfully infringed. Additionally, the lawsuit demands a permanent injunction to stop Anthropic from further infringing on Presley's music and an order for the company to destroy all unauthorized copies of the copyrighted material.
In response to the allegations, a spokesperson for Anthropic stated that the company disagrees with the claims and intends to defend the case fully. The company had previously reached a $1.5 billion settlement in a separate copyright case involving authors and the use of pirated books to train its models.
A Growing Wave of AI Music Litigation
The legal battle against Anthropic follows a broader trend of litigation targeting AI developers for using copyrighted musical works without consent. Other major music entities, including Universal Music, Concord Music Group, and Sony Music Publishing, have recently filed similar lawsuits against the company. Anthropic has also faced legal challenges from other independent publishers regarding the use of copyrighted song lyrics in its AI training processes.
