Anthropic Accused of Stealing Thousands of Songs in Music Label Suit

Three major music labels, Sony Music, Warner Chappell Music and ABKCO, have filed a federal lawsuit against AI company Anthropic, accusing it of stealing thousands of songs to train its AI model Claude. According to the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Anthropic improperly used "thousands upon thousands" of the labels' songs for the purpose of training Claude.

The suit demands a jury trial and alleges that Anthropic's actions amount to "straightforward piracy at massive scale." The labels are seeking statutory damages of up to $150,000 per willfully infringed work, as well as up to $25,000 for each alleged "removal and/or alteration" of copyright management information. Anthropic has stated that it disagrees with the publishers' claims and intends to defend itself in court.

This is the latest in a series of music label lawsuits against Anthropic, with Universal Music Publishing Group, Concord Music Group, and BMG also taking legal action in the past.