Industry & Advocacy News

Anthropic AI Class Certification: Important Information for Authors

Artificial Intelligence

August 19, 2025

• Share
• on Twitter (opens in a new tab)
• on Facebook (opens in a new tab)
• on Linkedin (opens in a new tab)
• via email

Earlier this summer, a federal court in California issued a major ruling in Bartz v. Anthropic, one of the copyright class action lawsuits involving AI. The court held that a trial should occur over whether Anthropic’s downloading of millions of books from the pirate websites Library Genesis (“LibGen”) and Pirate Library Mirror (“PiLiMi”) infringed the rights of copyright holders. (It also held that Anthropic’s use of books to train AI was fair use, a holding with which the Authors Guild disagrees.) On July 17, the court certified a class comprised of legal and beneficial owners of the rights in copyright-registered books downloaded by Anthropic from these sites.

It is important to remember that this case is a class action, a special kind of lawsuit allowed under federal law to address the claims of a large group commonly harmed by a defendant’s conduct. Here, the conduct at issue is Anthropic’s mass downloading and retention of books from pirate websites. A general overview of class actions is available here, and an overview of the AI class actions is here.

What Is the Impact of the Piracy and Class Certification Decisions on Authors?

All authors whose book(s) were downloaded by Anthropic from the pirate sites are potential members of the certified class, provided certain criteria are met. Such criteria include the legal or beneficial ownership of copyrights, the existence of an ISBN or ASIN number, and copyright registration with the Copyright Office (within three months of publication or before the infringement). Publishers are class members as well.

A trial is set for December 1. If the Plaintiffs succeed at trial and show willful infringement, damages will be minimally $750 per work and could be much higher.

What Do I Need to Do to Ensure I Receive My Share?

You do not need to do anything to be a member of the class. But to help ensure that you receive notices relating to your participation in the suit (including the opportunity to opt out of it), you should provide your current contact information and book titles to the court-appointed class counsel at the class action website.

We urge all authors who believe their books may have been unlawfully downloaded by Anthropic to provide the requested information and to share the website with any other authors you know.

• If you are a member of the Authors Guild or receive money through the Authors Registry, the contact information listed with those organizations has already been provided to the class action attorneys in response to a subpoena.
• If your contact information with the Guild is not up to date (check in the member portal here), or if you wish to be contacted at a different email or mailing address than that on file with the Guild, you should complete the form with your updated contact information at the class action website.
• If you have written under a pen name, please sign up using that name, and if you use more than one name, we recommend completing a separate entry for each name to ensure you are notified about all your books that are determined to be part of the class.

Once formal notices are sent out, class members will have the opportunity to either opt out or stay in the suit. The notice will explain this information.

Who Is Representing My Interests?

The Court has appointed three named plaintiffs to serve as representatives of the class. The three class representatives are Charles Graeber, Andrea Bartz, Inc., and MJ+KJ, Inc. The Court also appointed Class Counsel to represent the Class. Class Counsel are Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP and Susman Godfrey, LLP. Class Members do not need to hire their own attorneys, though they may do so. The Authors Guild is helping to coordinate publicity about the class action through various other creators’ groups to make sure that all authors whose books were illegally downloaded by Anthropic are notified. 

How Do I Know If My Book Was Downloaded?

Under the current schedule, Class Counsel will submit a list of affected works to the Court on September 1, 2025.

If you believe that books in which you hold a copyright interest may have been among those downloaded by Anthropic, we recommend that you provide your contact information on the website to make sure you receive important information about class membership and more. If you are not sure, please provide your information, as doing so will help Class Counsel and you determine whether you are a Class Member.