Anthropic, Suno Sued Over Alleged AI Training Using Madonna, Johnny Cash, Joni Mitchell's Music

Reservoir Media Management has filed two federal copyright lawsuits on October 21, 2026—one against Suno and one against Anthropic—taking aim at alleged misuse of copyrighted music for AI training. The cases were filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of California. Reservoir also involves its UK subsidiary and Shapiro, Bernstein & Co. Limited, the UK entity it fully owns, in both actions. Potential statutory damages across the two suits total nearly $340 million. The Suno complaint covers 1,050 compositions and alleges unauthorized reproduction, distribution, and creation of derivative works to train Suno’s generative AI, along with claims of circumventing digital access controls and removing copyright management information under the DMCA. The Anthropic lawsuit targets lyrics from 853 compositions, alleging copying to train Claude-family models.