Anthropic sued for allegedly using 274 Elvis Presley songs to train AI models

Anthropic sued for allegedly using 274 Elvis Presley songs to train AI models Authentic Brands Group says AI company infringed on rights of songs by the King such as Can’t Help Falling in Love

The owners of Elvis Presley ’s music catalogue are suing artificial intelligence ( AI ) company Anthropic for allegedly using Presley’s songs to train their models without permission.

Authentic Brands Group, the licensing organization that has ownership of both Presley’s music and likeness, is accusing Anthropic of infringing on the rights of 274 songs by Presley. The lawsuit, first reported by Billboard , was filed on Friday.

It further accuses Anthropic of utilizing 274 of Presley’s songs to train its AI model. These works include Can’t Help Falling in Love, All Shook Up and A Little Less Conversation. The plaintiffs are seeking $150,000 per infringed track, or about $41m (about £31m).

AI music platforms work by analyzing large amounts of recorded music in order to learn the sounds, structures and expressions of songs, and then allows users to create their own AI-generated music via text or speech prompts.

Musicians have repeatedly expressed concerns that their music and voices are being used without their permission by AI models, as well as fears that AI-generated “slop” music could replace human-made songs.

Some AI bots have even begun impersonating real living artists on music streaming platforms. Last week, music streaming giant Spotify announced it had removed about 50m songs considered AI slop from its recommendations to users over the past year.