U.S. Copyright Office Cites Legal Risk At Every Stage Of Generative AI

The U.S. Copyright Office has shared a report (before full release) about how AI systems use copyrighted content during training. This report explains that there are legal risks at every stage of how generative AI is built and trained.

The report came after people and lawmakers raised concerns about AI using copyrighted work, sometimes even pirated content, without asking for permission. While the Copyright Office doesn’t decide the law, its reports help guide future rules and court decisions.

Here are four main points from the report that AI companies should think about:

1. The way AI systems collect data, especially from copyrighted sources, might count as copyright infringement.
2. The report disagrees with the idea that training AI doesn’t involve copying. It says that making training datasets often includes making many copies of content, and these can be protected works.
3. If AI models memorize and repeat content that was copyrighted, even by mistake, that could still be breaking the rules. The report says this might go against the right to control copies of a work.
4. Some say AI training is “transformative” because it’s like how people learn. But the report disagrees. It says not all AI training counts as fair use just because it’s similar to human learning. Only some training might be transformative if it clearly adds something new to the original content.

Overall, the Copyright Office believes AI companies need to be very careful about how they use copyrighted materials.

Copyright Issues Found in Every Step of AI Development

One of the strongest points in the report is that copyright problems can happen at every step of how generative AI is made. It lists each stage and explains what could go wrong.

The report shows that there are copyright risks throughout the AI development process. Even though this report is not a legal rule, it may help shape future laws and guide court decisions.

Main Points From the Report:

AI Training and Copyright Problems:

The report says that collecting data and training models might involve copying work without permission. This could be considered copyright infringement.

Disagreement with AI Industry Defenses:

The Copyright Office does not agree with the idea that training AI is not copying. It also disagrees with comparing AI learning to how humans learn.

Fair Use and Transformative Use:

The report challenges the idea that AI use is always “transformative,” especially when the only defense is that AI learns like people do.

Copyright Risk in Every Stage of AI Development:

There are concerns at every level—starting with how data is collected, how training is done, how AI uses tools like RAG (retrieval-augmented generation), and what the final outputs are.

AI Models May Memorize Content:

The report warns that AI models might remember and keep copyrighted content in their systems. This means even using or sharing the model itself could be a problem.

AI Output Might Copy Original Work:

If AI creates things that look almost the same as original work, like images, characters, or articles, it could break copyright rules about copying or creating similar work.

RAG Can Also Cause Problems:

Whether RAG systems store copied content in a database or pull it from outside sources, both ways can involve making copies without permission.

The Copyright Office report shows that generative AI might break copyright law in many ways. It questions the use of copyrighted data without asking and pushes back on claims that AI works like the human brain. While the report doesn’t carry the power of a court ruling, it may help lawmakers and judges when they make decisions about AI and copyright in the future.