For example, he said, when prompted to create a song about Buddy Holly’s death, Claude generated lyrics from “American Pie” while claiming the output was original.
Anthropic had also implemented guardrails to prevent copyright infringement, Hailey noted, which he argued demonstrates the company’s awareness of the issue. “These guardrails were largely ineffective, but they show Anthropic knew there was an issue,” he said.
Anthropic’s lawyer, Sarang Damle of Latham & Watkins LLP, countered that the presence of guardrails indicates only that the company anticipated potential issues, not that it had specific knowledge of infringement.
Dispute Over Content Management Information
The plaintiffs also allege that Anthropic intentionally removed or altered electronic copyright management information (CMI) from song lyrics used to train Claude. This would constitute a violation of the Copyright Act.
Damle, however, dismissed this claim as “conclusory,” stating there was no direct evidence that Anthropic had removed any CMI.
