U.S. judge approves Anthropic’s US$1.5B settlement of copyright lawsuit
A San Francisco judge approved Anthropic's $1.5 billion settlement with authors who sued over alleged copyright infringement.Summary
U.S. District Judge Araceli Martinez‑Olguin in San Francisco gave final approval to a $1.5 billion settlement between Anthropic and a class of authors who alleged the company used their copyrighted books to train its AI chatbot Claude. The deal follows a 2024 ruling by retired Judge William Alsup that Anthropic’s use of the works was fair use, but that the company had illegally stored more than seven million pirated books in a central library. The settlement, the largest known U.S. copyright recovery, pays more than 91 % of the covered authors and publishers and includes $101 million in attorney fees. Some authors objected that the amount was too small or that certain rights holders were excluded, but Judge Martinez‑Olguin rejected those complaints and upheld the settlement. Separate lawsuits remain pending from authors who opted out.
(Source：CP24 Toronto)