Rapper Eminem also sued the artificial intelligence tool for copyright infringement
Elvis Presley Enterprises has taken artificial intelligence music generator Suno to court for copyright infringement, reported Courthouse News Service.
Elvis Presley Enterprises heads up a group of plaintiffs comprising organizations and individuals who either own or possess exclusive authority over the music legend’s name, image, likeness, and copyrights. The suit alleged that Suno used copyrighted works in training its models; moreover, the tool’s users could reportedly produce songs with vocals similar to Elvis Presley’s despite a lack of permission from the rights holders.
“Suno is the embodiment of why the ELVIS Act was so essentially required. All of the humanity, history, despair and triumph that constitutes Elvis’ identity was stolen and is stored on servers and harnessed by Suno to make massive amounts of money, despite Suno being there for none of what it took to create, maintain, or attempt to live up to this image, and without license, permission, or payment,” the plaintiffs wrote in the suit, a snippet of which was published by Courthouse News Service. “Suno did so intentionally, maliciously and fraudulently to financially benefit itself and artificially compete with Elvis’ likeness and copyrights, and continues to do so to this day.”
They presented almost 50 recordings as examples of Suno’s direct infringement of Presley’s likeness and copyrights – contradictions to the AI music generator’s recent statements that it did not repeat melodies from songs penned by others; nor did it permit prompts involving certain artists or copyrighted material. According to the plaintiffs, the recordings included a voice “readily identifiable” as and was exclusively attributed to Presley.
Another group of plaintiffs referred to as the Raleigh plaintiffs supported Elvis Presley Enterprises by offering three additional samples reportedly showing that Suno infringed directly on their copyrighted material. The Raleigh plaintiffs have exclusive control of the rights to hundreds of songs, per Courthouse News Service.
Overall, Suno allegedly infringed on the copyrights of 859 combined works, the plaintiffs said. The tool also reportedly breached Tennessee’s common law right of publicity, dodged copyright protection measures, and either erased or changed copyright management information.
In addition to damages, the plaintiffs are seeking an injunction banning Suno from further copyright infringement as well as a court order for Suno to destroy unauthorized copies of infringed works, including copies in data sets. They are also requesting a full training data record.
“The name, image, likeness and music of Elvis Presley are among the most valuable intellectual property assets in the world. We protect those rights vigorously,” Lark-Marie Antón, who is representing the plaintiffs, told Courthouse News Service.
Both Elvis Presley Enterprises and the Raleigh plaintiffs are being represented by attorneys Richard Busch, Mark Block, David Niemierzycki, and Andrew Davis from Adams & Reese and attorneys Jeffrey Faucette and Martin Glick of Skaggs Faucette. Elvis Presley Enterprises filed its suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Friday November 6.
A Suno representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment, per Courthouse News Service.
This is not the first suit involving Presley’s IP and an AI tool. On October 23, a group of companies owning much of Presley’s IP sued AI giant Anthropic over the unauthorized use of 274 Elvis Presley songs to train models, NME reported.
Moreover, Elvis Presley Enterprises is not the only one challenging Suno to a legal battle – on the same day, the rights holders for rapper Marshall Mathers, who goes by Eminem, also sued the AI music generator in the Northern District of California for training models on copyrighted materials and including copyrighted lyrics in outputs.
Eight Mile Style is the music publisher and copyright administration company owning and administering the rights to license Eminem’s songs, It is being represented by the attorneys acting for Elvis Presley Enterprises and the Raleigh plaintiffs.
