UMG Can’t Stop Anthropic AI Training In Lyrics Copyright Lawsuit, Judge Rules
Rejecting an immediate injunction, a judge says it remains an “open question” whether its illegal to use copyrighted songs to train artificial intelligence models.
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A federal judge has refused Universal Music Group’s request for an injunction that would have immediately blocked artificial intelligence company Anthropic PBC from using copyrighted lyrics to train future AI models.
In decision issued Tuesday, Judge Eumi K. Lee ruled that it remained an “open question” whether using copyrighted materials to train AI is illegal – meaning UMG and other music companies could not show that they faced the kind of “irreparable harm” necessary to win such a drastic remedy.
“Publishers are essentially asking the court to define the contours of a licensing market for AI training where the threshold question of fair use remains unsettled,” the judge wrote. “The court declines to award publishers the extraordinary relief of a preliminary injunction based on legal rights … that have not yet been established.”
The ruling was not on the actual merits of the case, but it represents a victory for Anthropic — which likely would have needed to overhaul its training operations if the judge had sided with UMG. The case will now proceed ahead, likely with a motion by Anthropic seeking to dismiss the case entirely.
An attorney for UMG and the other music companies did not immediately return a request for comment on Wednesday.
UMG and other music publishers sued Anthropic in 2023, claiming the company was violating copyrights en masse by using songs without authorization to teach its Claude AI models how to spit out new lyrics. Anthropic denies the allegations, saying its training is a so-called “fair use” of copyright materials.
The case is one of many lawsuits, filed by authors, newspapers, musicians and other creatives, that will test whether AI companies are breaking the law by taking the fundamental step in creating their technology – a potentially trillion-dollar question in the booming industry.
A month after UMG filed its case, the music giant demanded a preliminary injunction – type of interim ruling that would prohibit the AI firm from continuing to use the songs while the case plays out in court. “If the court waits until this litigation ends to address what is already clear—that Anthropic is improperly using publishers’ copyrighted works—then the damage will be done.”
But in Tuesday’s decision, Lee said UMG and the other music companies couldn’t show such harm because that key question in the case – the trillion-dollar issue of fair use – has not been reached by a final ruling, either in the current lawsuit against Anthropic or in any of the other case against AI firms.
“[Earlier] cases demonstrate that emerging technologies often test the bounds and principles of copyright law,” the judge wrote. “Here, it is an open question whether training generative AI models with copyrighted material is infringement or fair use.”
Even if the legal question was settled, Lee said that any harm caused by Anthropic’s use of the lyrics could later be compensated by a monetary judgment, meaning it was not the kind of irreversible damage that must be stopped before the case plays out.
In a statement to Billboard on Wednesday, a spokeswoman for Anthropic said the company was pleased that the judge had rejected UMG’s “disruptive and amorphous request” for an immediate injunction: “As the case continues, we look forward to explaining why use of copyrighted material for training large language models aligns with fair use principles under copyright law.”
