Anthropic’s $1.5 billion settlement in authors’ class action copyright lawsuit gets approved
A U.S. federal judge has approved a $1.5 billion settlement in a class-action lawsuit against Anthropic regarding the use of copyrighted books to train AI models. While the settlement provides compensation to authors, it leaves broader questions about AI copyright and piracy unresolved.
Why it matters
This landmark settlement sets a significant legal precedent for how AI companies compensate creators for training data, though it does not fully settle the debate on fair use.
A U.S. federal judge in San Francisco on Monday (July 21, 2026) approved a $1.5 billion settlement in a copyright class action lawsuit by authors and publishers against Claude chatbot maker Anthropic.
A preliminary approval of the settlement was issued in 2025 by Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, and now Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin has issued the final approval.
The settlement is related to Anthropic using copyrighted works of authors to train its AI model. The AI lab, per the lawsuit, has used shadow libraries like LibGen and Pirate Library Mirror to access published works, violating copyright laws to develop its AI models.
The judge ruled last year that Anthropic’s use of the creative works came under fair use. However, the law took issue with the way Anthropic saved millions of pirated books.
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