First action brought by a collective managment organization against a provider of generative AI systems

GEMA is the first European collective management organization to file a lawsuit against OpenAI over the unlicensed use of copyright works.

GEMA has become the first European collective management organization to file a lawsuit over the unlicensed use of copyright-protected musical works against a provider of generative artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Specifically, this pertains to the U.S.-based company OpenAI, the operator of auto-generative AI chatbot systems. GEMA accuses OpenAI of reproducing copyright-protected song lyrics by German authors without obtaining the necessary licenses or compensating the authors of the copyright works used. The lawsuit aims to demonstrate that OpenAI systematically utilizes GEMA’s repertoire to train its AI systems.

This case could have far-reaching implications for managing copyrights in relation to AI models and for defining the role of collective management organizations in this process.