Sony and Warner sue Anthropic for copyright infringement

Music publishers Sony and Warner have initiated legal action against Anthropic for the illegal use of protected music compositions.

31 August 2026Tagblick Newsdesk

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Archive photo: Sony and Warner sue Anthropic for copyright infringement — Archive photoPhoto: Sony Music Entertainment Japan · Wikimedia Commons · Public domain

Sony Music and Warner Chappell have filed a lawsuit against Anthropic in a federal court in Northern California. The publishers accuse the AI company of illegally downloading tens of thousands of copyrighted music compositions and using them to train their AI models, particularly the Claude model.

The plaintiffs describe the extent of the alleged copyright violations as "one of the largest thefts of intellectual property in history." Anthropic is under significant legal pressure following a recent settlement of $1.5 billion with book authors.

The accusations involve the acquisition of music works via torrents, scraping, and downloads that were used in the development and operation of the Claude models. This constitutes a blatant violation of copyright, according to the lawsuit's argument.

Anthropic is already facing similar legal challenges, highlighting the growing concerns within the industry regarding compliance with copyright laws in the development of AI systems. Thus, the issue of copyright infringement related to AI technologies remains highly relevant.

The complaint was drafted by Sony Music and Warner Chappell, both of whom make it clear that they have chosen to pursue legal action to protect their intellectual property rights. The situation raises questions about the legal standards governing the use of copyrighted content by AI applications.

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