Copyright chaos threatens the future of artificial intelligence: legal uncertainty kills innovation

Anthropic reached a $1.5 billion settlement in an AI training data copyright case highlighting the industry's escalating litigation risks, with 40 lawsuits against AI companies now. The statutory compensation under U.S. copyright law (up to $150,000 per work) and class action rules, even without conclusive market damage, create huge financial risks. Courts have increasingly questioned the "fair use" defense, especially when it comes to pirated data. Legal uncertainty has the potential to kill AI innovation and the competitiveness of the United States, with some experts proposing the formulation of the Defense Production Act to enforce licenses to resolve the crisis.