The companies that own Elvis Presley‘s music have sued Anthropic, the AI developer behind Claude, claiming it trained its models on 274 of his copyrighted songs without permission. The Elvis Presley lawsuit was filed on Friday, October 23, and first reported by Billboard.
A unit of Authentic Brands Group leads the case. The licensing company controls much of Presley’s song catalog, along with his trademarks and the rights to his name, image and likeness. Several other entities that hold Elvis rights joined as co-plaintiffs. Record labels and the RIAA have taken AI companies to court before. Still, this is one of the most prominent cases brought on behalf of a single artist’s estate.
What the Elvis Presley lawsuit claims
The complaint argues that Anthropic used music on a mass scale to build technology that can produce “unlicensed derivative works.” Songs named in the filing include “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” “Don’t Be Cruel” and “A Little Less Conversation.” That last track found a new audience after a remix in the early 2000s. The filing also lists “All Shook Up,” “Return to Sender” and “(You’re the) Devil in Disguise.”
Lead attorney Richard Busch put the case in blunt terms. “The Elvis Plaintiffs bring this action to enforce these exclusive rights against the defendant that has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before,” he wrote. He added: “The Elvis Plaintiffs are deeply protective of these iconic songs.”
Busch has handled major music copyright cases before. In the 2000s, he represented Eminem in disputes over digital download royalties. Later, he represented Marvin Gaye‘s estate against Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams. That case ended with a jury finding that “Blurred Lines” infringed Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up.”
Fair use is still unresolved
Anthropic already faces several lawsuits over how it trains its models, including one from music publishers. Training a large language model means ingesting huge volumes of existing work. AI companies argue that this practice falls under copyright’s fair use defense. However, courts have not settled that question yet. It is still open across dozens of cases, with billions of dollars in potential damages on the line.
So far, most AI music litigation has focused on Suno, the AI song generator. Universal Music Group, Sony Music and Warner Music Group all sued Suno in 2024 over similar training claims. Suno settled with Warner last year and says it wants to partner with the music industry. Its cases with UMG and Sony continue.
The Elvis Presley lawsuit follows the same basic argument as those earlier cases. The difference is the plaintiff: an estate tied to one of the best-selling recording artists in history, rather than a label or trade group.
Why the case matters beyond music
The fair use fight behind the Elvis Presley lawsuit also reaches into games. Video game performers represented by SAG-AFTRA went on strike in 2024, in part over protections against AI replicas of their voices and likenesses. That strike ended in 2025 with new consent and disclosure rules for AI use. A ruling on training data in a music case could shape how studios and AI vendors license other creative work, including game audio and voice performances.
Anthropic did not immediately respond to Billboard’s request for comment on Saturday. For now, the Elvis Presley lawsuit adds a famous artist estate to the growing list of rights holders that are challenging how AI companies source their training data.