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Elvis Presley Rightsholders Sue Anthropic for Training on 274 Songs Without Permission
Confirmed
In Short: The owners of Elvis Presley's song catalog have filed a lawsuit against Anthropic, alleging the company used his songs without permission to train its AI model Claude.
The owners of rights to much of Elvis Presley’s song catalog have sued Anthropic, claiming the artificial-intelligence giant used his songs without permission to train its online agent Claude. The lawsuit, initiated by Authentic Brands Group and other legal entities that control Presley’s intellectual property, includes 274 of his best-known songs, such as 'All Shook Up,' 'Can’t Help Falling in Love,' 'Don’t Be Cruel,' and 'Return to Sender.'
The plaintiffs are seeking statutory damages of up to $150,000 for each of the 274 songs, amounting to approximately $41.1 million, according to the lawsuit filed in federal court in San Francisco. The lawyers for the Presley plaintiffs are also seeking roughly $50 million in damages, along with reimbursement of court costs and attorneys fees.
The lawsuit contends that Anthropic stored Elvis’ songs into a permanent, general-purpose central library intended to be retained indefinitely, from which subsets were selected and copied again to train the next generation of Claude models. The plaintiffs argue that Anthropic’s actions are destroying the value of these works in a matter of a few years with only profit as its motive.
According to the filing, when Claude was asked to recreate songs 'for a modern audience,' it produced material that closely resembled the originals. 'Keep landing very close to the originals: same structure, same hooks reused with light rewording, and full sets of verses/choruses/bridges. That’s edging past “inspired by” into reproducing the copyrighted song, even when the words are swapped out,' said lead attorney Richard Busch.
The lawsuit claims that Anthropic has illegally used the aforementioned Presley songs to create 'unlicensed derivative works' with Claude. The works named include 'Can’t Help Falling in Love,' 'A Little Less Conversation,' 'Don’t Be Cruel,' 'All Shook Up,' 'Return to Sender,' and 'You’re the Devil in Disguise.'
The plaintiffs are deeply protective of these iconic songs, which they describe as some of the most groundbreaking, revolutionary, and enduring musical compositions in human history. 'Defendant has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before,' the plaintiffs said in the lawsuit.
In a statement, an Anthropic spokesperson said, 'We disagree with the claims and intend to defend this case fully.' Last year, Anthropic agreed to a landmark $1.5 billion settlement in a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by authors who alleged the company had illegally used pirated copies of their books to train AI models.
This lawsuit marks one of the first high-profile cases where the owner of a single artist’s catalog has sued for copyright infringement. The plaintiffs are seeking about $41m, which reflects the maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per work for willful infringement under US copyright law, multiplied across the 274 songs.
Background
The owners of Elvis Presley's song catalog have filed a lawsuit against Anthropic, alleging the company used his songs without permission to train its AI model Claude.
The owners of Elvis Presley's song catalog have sued Anthropic, claiming the company used his songs without permission to train its AI model Claude.
What's confirmed
- “We disagree with the claims and intend to defend this case fully,” an Anthropic spokesperson said in a statement Sunday.
- The owners of Elvis Presley’s music catalogue have sued AI company Anthropic, claiming its Claude models were trained on 274 of his songs without permission.
- The owners of Elvis Presley ‘s music have launched legal action against AI company Anthropic, accusing it of using 274 of his songs to train its models without permission.
- In October 2023, Universal Music Publishing Group, Concord Music Group and ABKCO sued Anthropic, alleging that Claude had reproduced copyrighted lyrics without authorisation.
- “The Elvis Plaintiffs bring this action to enforce these exclusive rights against the defendant that has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before,” wrote lead attorney Richard Busch.
- Anthropic is facing a hefty lawsuit from the owners of Elvis Presley’s music, alleging the AI giant used hundreds of Presley’s songs to train its models without permission.
- The subsidiary of Authentic Brands Group, which controls the bulk of Presley’s intellectual property—including his name, image, and likeness rights—filed the lawsuit on October 23.
- “The Elvis Plaintiffs are deeply protective of these iconic songs.” “‘Claude’ has created infringing output of copyrighted material of virtually every song from every catalog available on the internet, including the Works,” the lawsuit states.
- “Defendant has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before,” the plaintiffs said in a lawsuit filed Friday in federal court in San Francisco.
- Legendary tracks including “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” “A Little Less Conversation,” and “Don’t Be Cruel” are among the 274 songs the plaintiffs allege Anthropic used, as reported by Billboard.
- “The Elvis Plaintiffs are deeply protective of these iconic songs.” According to the filing, the plaintiffs seek statutory damages of up to $150,000 for each song, totaling approximately $41.1 million.
What's still developing
- He represented Eminem in landmark cases in the 2000s over digital downloads, and later represented Marvin Gaye ’s estate in a famous copyright case against Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams, eventually winning a much-debated verdict that their “Blurred Lines” infringed Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up.” Read the actual lawsuit filed against Anthropic here.
- Nicolas Cage, who recently starred in “Spider-Noir,” said he won’t work with Amazon again after a disagreement over an AI waiver.