Sony Music Publishing and Warner Chappell have filed an Anthropic music lawsuit, accusing the AI company of using copyrighted songs and lyrics to train its Claude models without permission.
The publishers allege that Anthropic acquired protected works through torrenting, scraping, downloads and illegal online libraries. They claim the alleged activity involved music on a massive scale and may cover tens of thousands of songs.
Anthropic has not publicly responded to the latest complaint.
Labels allege large-scale copyright infringement
Sony and Warner argue that Anthropic unlawfully copied musical compositions while collecting training material and then used those works as inputs for Claude.
The complaint also alleges that Claude can reproduce copyrighted material in its outputs. According to the publishers, the alleged conduct harms songwriters and music rights holders.
The labels say Anthropic may have altered or removed copyright-management information while obtaining and processing the training data.
They are seeking damages of up to $150,000 for each alleged copyright infringement. The complaint also seeks up to $25,000 for every alleged copyright-management violation.
Earlier case involved shadow libraries
The publishers point to an earlier case in which Anthropic admitted downloading copyrighted material from shadow libraries, including Library Genesis and Pirate Library Mirror.
That class-action case ended in a $1.5 billion settlement. The companies argue that the book collections Anthropic obtained through those sources may have included lyrics and sheet music for artists represented by Sony and Warner.
The labels say they cannot yet determine the full scale of the alleged infringement because Anthropic has not disclosed all relevant information.
AI training faces growing music copyright scrutiny
The Anthropic music lawsuit is part of a wider fight over whether AI companies can use copyrighted works to train large language models and generative systems.
Music publishers, artists and collecting societies have increasingly challenged AI firms over the alleged unauthorised use of recordings, lyrics and compositions.
Last month, a Munich regional court ruled that AI music company Suno had unlawfully trained its model on copyright-protected songs from GEMA’s repertoire in the US. A Suno spokesperson said the company was considering an appeal.
The case against Anthropic could further test how copyright law applies to AI training data, especially when companies allegedly obtain that material from unauthorised sources.
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