Rights holders to Elvis Presley’s songs have filed a lawsuit against Anthropic, the American company behind the Claude AI model. They accuse the developer of using 274 of the singer’s songs without permission to train its artificial intelligence and are seeking $41.1 million in damages.
Compensation of $150,000 per song
According to The Guardian, the plaintiffs filed the lawsuit in federal court in California on Oct. 23. The plaintiffs include Authentic Brands Group and other entities that hold the rights to Presley’s musical legacy.
They allege that Anthropic used lyrics from well-known hits, such as «Can’t Help Falling in Love» and «All Shook Up,» without permission. The plaintiffs are seeking $150,000 for each of the 274 songs.
They also claim Claude can reproduce portions of the original works with slight lyric alterations. Including additional claims, the total amount sought could reach $48.6 million.
Anthropic denies the allegations and intends to defend itself in court.
A $1.5 billion settlement with Anthropic
This is not the company’s first copyright-related dispute. Anthropic agreed to pay $1.5 billion to settle a lawsuit brought by authors who accused the developer of using pirated copies of approximately 500,000 books to train its AI.
Legal action against AI developers
Music companies made similar claims against other AI developers too. In August 2024, a Munich court supported the German rights organization GEMA in a dispute with the AI music-generation platform Suno. The company was accused of using copyrighted works without the rights holders’ permission.
