A federal judge in San Francisco is requesting additional information before giving final approval to a massive $1.5 billion settlement between artificial intelligence company Anthropic and authors who claim the company improperly used their written works to develop its AI chatbot Claude.
During Thursday’s hearing, U.S. District Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin withheld final approval while seeking more details about attorney compensation and payments to lead plaintiffs in what represents the largest known copyright settlement in U.S. history.
A now-retired judge had previously given preliminary approval to the agreement in September.
This lawsuit represents one of many filed by copyright holders, including writers and media companies, challenging how technology firms train their artificial intelligence systems, and marks the first significant U.S. case to reach a settlement.
During the proceedings, an attorney representing the authors revealed that copyright holders have filed claims covering more than 92% of the approximately 480,000 works covered by the settlement. However, the agreement has faced criticism from some authors who believe the settlement amount is insufficient, provides excessive compensation to attorneys, or improperly excludes certain copyright holders.
The authors initiated their lawsuit against Anthropic in 2024, claiming the company, which receives backing from Amazon and Alphabet, utilized unauthorized copies of their books to train Claude to interact with users.
In a previous ruling last June, Judge Alsup determined that Anthropic’s use of the authors’ works for training purposes constituted fair use, but concluded the company violated copyright by storing over 7 million unauthorized books in a “central library” that wasn’t exclusively designated for AI development. A trial had been set for December to establish damages for the alleged copyright infringement, with potential penalties reaching hundreds of billions of dollars.
Additional authors and publishers pursuing similar claims have initiated separate legal actions against Anthropic that remain active. On Wednesday, a coalition of more than 25 writers who chose not to participate in the settlement, including Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida, filed a fresh lawsuit against Anthropic in California.
