US Court Rules AI-Made Art Cannot Be Copyrighted

A U.S. court in Washington, D.C. has found that an artwork produced by artificial intelligence without any human involvement is not protected by copyright under American law.

U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled on Friday that only writings by human writers are eligible for copyright protection, upholding the Copyright Office’s decision to deny computer scientist Stephen Thaler’s application on behalf of his DABUS system.

The ruling on Friday comes after Thaler had unsuccessful attempts to obtain U.S. patents for ideas he claimed were the work of DABUS, or Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience.

With varying degrees of success, Thaler has also filed for DABUS-generated patents in the UK, South Africa, Australia, and Saudi Arabia.

Ryan Abbott, Thaler’s attorney, said on Monday that they would appeal the judgment since they strongly disagree with it. In a statement released on Monday, the Copyright Office said that it “believes the court reached the correct result.”

Generative AI is a rapidly expanding subject that has generated fresh intellectual property concerns. Despite the artist’s claim that the AI system Midjourney was an integral part of their creative process, the Copyright Office denied the artist’s request for copyrights on pictures created using the system.

The unauthorized use of copyrighted materials to train generative AI has also given rise to many ongoing litigation.

“We are approaching new frontiers in copyright as artists put AI in their toolbox,” Howell said on Friday, adding that this would lead to “challenging questions” for copyright law.

But this case is not nearly as complicated, Howell added.

Thaler submitted an application for a copyright in 2018 for “A Recent Entrance to Paradise,” a work of art he claimed his AI system produced entirely on its own without any human involvement. Last year, the office denied the application and said that in order for creative works to be copyrighted, they must have human writers.

In a federal court appeal, Thaler argued that the judgment should not have been made and that permitting AI copyrights would be consistent with the aim of copyright as stated in the U.S. constitution to “promote the progress of science and useful arts.”

The Copyright Office and Howell both agreed that human authorship is a “bedrock requirement of copyright” based on “centuries of settled understanding.”