Round Hill Music, a $1.1 billion music rights holder, has filed copyright infringement lawsuits against Anthropic and Suno. The lawsuits, filed on August 17 in the US District Court for the Northern District of California, allege that both AI companies used copyrighted lyrics without permission to train their models.
The cases target Anthropic's general-purpose chatbot Claude and Suno's AI music generator, both of which allegedly ingested lyrics from at least 500 titles in Round Hill's portfolio. Round Hill's catalog includes works from notable artists such as James Brown, The Kinks, and the Goo Goo Dolls.
Alleged Copyright Infringement
For Anthropic, the accusation is that Claude's ability to reproduce or reference song lyrics stems from unauthorized training data. For Suno, the claim is more sensitive, as its product is designed to generate music.
Round Hill's lawsuits are the latest in a growing line of copyright actions from the music industry aimed at AI developers. The publisher's size and independence make the suits notable, suggesting that the issue has moved beyond major labels.
By suing both Anthropic and Suno, Round Hill is making a statement that using copyrighted material without a license will be pursued, regardless of the use case. No settlements or resolutions have been reported in either case.