Anthropic, the maker of the chatbot Claude, is facing a new copyright lawsuit. Authors claim the company used their books and hundreds of thousands of other authors’ books without permission to train artificial intelligence.
Allegations and Plaintiffs
According to Reuters, the plaintiffs include writers Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber, and Kirk Wallace Johnson. They claim Anthropic used pirated versions of their works, and are seeking monetary damages and an injunction to stop the unauthorized use of the works.
Broader Legal Landscape
The lawsuit is part of a larger wave of lawsuits brought by copyright holders, including artists, news outlets, and record labels, who are seeking clarification on how and on what grounds tech companies are freely using their materials to train their generative AI systems. We’ll keep you updated as this situation develops.
An Anthropic spokesperson said Tuesday that the company is aware of the lawsuit and is evaluating it, but declined to comment further, citing ongoing litigation. A lawyer for the authors also declined to comment.
It should be noted that this is the second lawsuit against Anthropic. Last year, music publishers filed a lawsuit accusing the company of misusing copyrighted song lyrics to train Claude. Several groups of authors have previously filed lawsuits against companies like OpenAI and Meta, accusing them of similarly misusing works to train their language models, adds NIX Solutions.
As the use of AI and machine learning technologies continues to grow, the legal challenges surrounding the use of copyrighted materials in their development will likely remain a significant and evolving issue. We’ll keep you updated on any new developments in this case and the broader implications for the AI industry.