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Suno Faces Lawsuit For Copyright Infringement From GEMA

Martina
23 January 2025, Thursday

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Recent reports indicate that the AI music generator Suno is being sued for copyright infringement by the German GEMA, a prominent collection society and licensing body. The company, along with fellow AI firm Udio, is already facing a significant lawsuit from major recording companies, including UMG, Sony Music, and Warner Music.

Will Suno drown in copyright lawsuits?

The latest developments show that things are becoming more complicated for the AI companies Suno and Udio. After raising $500 million in capital in April 2024, both companies were—perhaps to their surprise—sued by the major record labels for allegedly training their AI tools on copyrighted material without authorization. To make matters worse, the two companies essentially admitted to the legal accusations, as court filings from August of that year suggest.

Now, Suno is challenged by yet another large-scale lawsuit, this time filed by GEMA, the German collecting society and performance rights organization. GEMA, representing about 95,000 German members and over two million global rightsholders, alleges that Suno has been “processing protected recordings of world-famous songs” without permission or compensation.

While the collecting society has acknowledged that Suno allows users to produce playable audio using simple prompts, thereby assisting artists in creating music, it has detected that its software’s content obviously infringes copyrights.

“In terms of melody, harmony, and rhythm, this content largely corresponds to world-famous works whose authors GEMA represents,” the organization stated in the lawsuit.

The legal document further elaborates on the accusation, claiming that the company’s AI software generates content that closely mirrors world-famous works. Among the examples of original recordings listed are Forever Young by Alphaville, Daddy Cool by Frank Farian (famously performed by Boney M), and Cheri Cheri Lady by Moder Talking.

To bolster its case, GEMA has also released audio samples of the songs generated by Suno and a video explainer featuring musicologist Julia Blum. The explainer demonstrates the similarities between the original Boney M’s Daddy Cool and the “AI plagiarism” produced by Suno’s software.

“The results clearly show that Suno Inc. has systematically used GEMA’s repertoire for the training of its music tool and is now exploiting it commercially without giving the authors of the works a financial share,” GEMA said on the audio comparison.

GEMA vs. ChatGPT

GEMA’s lawsuit against Suno comes about two months after the collecting society took legal action against OpenAI, the US-based giant behind ChatGPT. In the suit, GEMA accused the company of reproducing protected original song lyrics by certain German songwriters via its ChatGPT chatbot without “having acquired licenses or paid the authors in question.”

In response to the growing challenges posed by generative AI, the organization introduced the AI Charter, which aims to establish principles for using AI technology in music and to advocate for fair remuneration for human creatives.

“Generative AI provides opportunities but also carries significant risks for the rights and livelihoods of creators. In our understanding, human creativity is at the center, and the use of musical works created by people in the context of generative AI must be dealt with in a transparent manner and must attract fair pay,” said GEMA CEO Dr. Tobias Holzmüller.

However, AI companies don’t seem too concerned with such guidelines or the overall concept of fair treatment of human creatives and their proper compensation. Regardless, GEMA remains optimistic about the future, believing that artists will ultimately see the light at the end of the tunnel in their collective battle with generative AI.

“Providers of generative AI must respect copyright law and remunerate authors for their creative work… The lawsuit against Suno Inc. is part of an overall concept of measures taken by GEMA, at the end of which there will be fair treatment of authors and their remuneration,” added Dr Kai Welp, General Counsel of GEMA.