Elvis Presley rightsholders sue Anthropic over AI training music

Rightsholders of Elvis Presley have launched legal action against artificial intelligence company Anthropic for allegedly using his music to train its models without authorization. Euronews, The Guardian, and NME reported that the lawsuit was filed on Friday, 23 October, in the US District Court for the Northern District of California by a subsidiary of Authentic Brands Group. The organization controls much of the singer's intellectual property, including his name, image, likeness, and trademark rights. [1][2][3]

The legal action claims that Anthropic copied 274 songs from Presley's catalogue without permission to train its artificial intelligence assistant, Claude. Euronews, The Guardian, and Pitchfork noted that the alleged copyright infringement includes well known tracks such as Can't Help Falling in Love, Don't Be Cruel, and A Little Less Conversation. [1][2][3][7]

Financial damages requested in the lawsuit total over $40 million, with Euronews and NME citing an amount exceeding $40 million, while The New York Times and Gulf News reported the figure as $41 million or $41.1 million. The New York Times also reported that Anthropic disagrees with the claims made in the filing. [1][3][5][9]

Presley, who earned the title King of Rock and Roll, achieved major commercial success beginning in 1956 with hits including Don't Be Cruel. Anthropic is an artificial intelligence firm that develops the Claude model using safety techniques such as Constitutional AI. [1][12][14][15]