Authentic Brands Group Sues Anthropic Over $41 Million

Owners of Elvis Presley’s music rights have filed a $41 million federal lawsuit against AI company Anthropic, accusing it of training its Claude models on 274 copyrighted songs without permission. The legal action, filed in California on October 23, 2026, targets automated scraping and alleged copyright infringement.

Authentic Brands Group Files $41 Million Lawsuit Over 274 Elvis Songs

Authentic Brands Group, alongside other trusts and companies holding a stake in the music catalog, filed the lawsuit on Friday, October 23, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California as reported by USA Today. The licensing platform that controls the intellectual property of Elvis Presley has taken legal action against artificial intelligence developer Anthropic. The complaint targets the alleged use of 274 masterworks to train the company’s AI chatbot, Claude.

Anthropic Accused of Scraping Data and Stripping Metadata

According to the lawsuit, Anthropic avoided paying licensing fees or securing permissions by deploying automated scraping tools to gather training data throughout the entire development of its models. The plaintiffs allege that the company went to great lengths to remove copyright management information and metadata from the songs. Attorneys for Authentic Brands argued that this stripping of identifying markers ensured Claude could not reproduce provenance information in its outputs, thereby concealing the underlying copyrighted material.

Elvis Presley's music owners sue AI company Anthropic over copyright

Authentic Brands’ attorneys wrote in the lawsuit obtained by The Commercial Appeal, part of USA TODAY Network:

Put another way, defendant Anthropic has essentially put to the test the adage of whether monkeys and typewriters could, provided enough time, recreate 'Hamlet.'

Instagram

Richard Busch Represents Rightsholders in Anthropic Lawsuit

The rightsholders are represented by lead attorney Richard Busch. He previously represented the estate of Marvin Gaye in the landmark Blurred Lines copyright trial against Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams.

Busch stated that Anthropic has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before.

Authentic Brands Group Sues Anthropic Over $41 Million — Photo: telegraphindia.com

Universal Music Group, Concord Music Group, Sony Music Publishing, and Warner Chappell Music have all initiated actions against the artificial intelligence firm. Just days before the Elvis estate filing, Reservoir Media Management sued Anthropic for $149.3 million over works by Johnny Cash, Madonna, and Joni Mitchell noted in legal filings. Anthropic previously agreed to a $1.5 billion settlement with authors over book copyrights as reported last year.

Statutory Damages Demanded as Anthropic Vows Full Defense

Authentic Brands is asking the federal court to order the destruction of all infringing material and is seeking statutory damages of up to $150,000 per infringed work. With 274 songs listed in the complaint, those damages are projected to reach approximately $41.1 million. Additional penalties of $2,500 per licensing agreement violation and $25,000 for each instance of scrubbing copyright data apply according to court figures.

Authentic Brands Group is leading a coalition of plaintiffs suing Anthropic for allegedly training Claude on Elvis Presley songs. They are seeking $41 million. https://t.co/Bh2iArimDT

— https://x.com/NYMag/status/2114496169967853601