Apple has found itself at the center of another AI copyright battle, as a group of creators has filed a lawsuit accusing the tech giant of illegally using copyrighted materials to train its artificial intelligence models.
Two neuroscientists are suing Apple, alleging that the corporation used stolen book libraries to train its AI models, which contained their work as well as other people’s copyrighted works.
The plaintiffs claim that Apple’s AI systems were trained using their works without permission or compensation, in what they describe as a “massive and deliberate infringement” of intellectual property rights.
The lawsuit, filed in a U.S. federal court, alleges that Apple collected data from copyrighted books, articles, and online materials to enhance its generative AI capabilities—the same kind of practice that has already sparked legal action against companies like OpenAI, Meta, and Google.
“Apple built its AI on the backs of authors and creators whose works were taken without consent,” the complaint states. “This is not innovation—it’s exploitation.”
It is actually the second lawsuit in less than a month that accuses the iPhone manufacturer of utilizing copyrighted content to train its Apple Intelligence models. The action was filed by neurology professors Dr. Susana Martinez-Conde and Dr. Stephen Macknik of SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University.
