Judge approves Anthropic's $1.5 billion copyright settlement

Published Jul 23, 05:30 PM UTC

On July 24, 2026, Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín approved a $1.5 billion settlement between AI company Anthropic and a group of authors who accused it of using their books to train its large language models without permission. The settlement, one of the largest copyright settlements in history, resolves a nearly two-year legal process that began in August 2024. In June 2025, Judge William Alsup had partly ruled in Anthropic's favor, finding that using legally acquired books for training constituted fair use, but he did not shield the company's use of pirated books. The settlement covers nearly 500,000 books, with authors receiving roughly $3,000 per work. The agreement does not cover future conduct by Anthropic and does not prevent authors whose works were not on the court-approved list from suing. The article argues this settlement sets a bad precedent and could lead to more lawsuits against AI companies, many of which use pirated data for training.