Anthropic's Updated Terms of Service: Enhanced Copyright Protection for AI Outputs

Anthropic, a leading company in generative artificial intelligence, has recently updated its commercial terms of service, effective January 1, 2024, to address important concerns regarding intellectual property and data usage. This update is particularly significant for users of Anthropic's Claude API, which is also available through Amazon's generative AI development suite, Bedrock.

Under the new terms, Anthropic has taken a strong stance to protect its customers from copyright infringement claims related to the authorized use of their services. The company commits to indemnify its enterprise Claude API customers from such claims, promising to defend against allegations that a customer's paid use of Anthropic's services, including data used to train their models, violates third-party intellectual property rights such as patents, trade secrets, trademarks, or copyrights​​.

This move places Anthropic alongside other major generative AI providers like Microsoft, Adobe, Shutterstock, OpenAI, IBM, and Google, who have also implemented similar intellectual property protection measures for their generative AI outputs. These protections, however, come with certain limitations. For instance, the indemnification does not cover claims related to customer prompts or uses of the service that violate the terms of use, arise from willful misconduct or violations of law, modifications made by the customer to the services or outputs, or the combination of services or outputs with technology not provided by Anthropic. Additionally, certain patent or trademark-related violations are also excluded from this protection​​.

Furthermore, it's important for businesses considering the use of generative AI tools to thoroughly analyze the terms and conditions of the provider, taking into account not only legal factors but also non-legal considerations like pricing and technical capabilities. This comprehensive review should include an examination of the intellectual property protection provisions and any relevant exclusions offered by the provider, especially for paid or enterprise customers. Such diligence is crucial in the current landscape where copyright and privacy lawsuits against generative AI providers, concerning the scraping of copyrighted works for training AI models, are still ongoing. These legal battles present unresolved intellectual property issues, making the protections offered by companies like Anthropic a welcome addition for their customers. However, it's vital for customers to fully understand and consider these terms and indemnification provisions in the context of their specific or potential uses​​.

 Legal actions such as those initiated by Universal Music Group against Anthropic in October 2023, and the lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft by author Julian Sancton, highlight the complexities and evolving nature of copyright law in the age of artificial intelligence. These cases underscore the importance of AI companies proactively addressing copyright concerns and ensuring they have robust protections in place for their customers. Anthropic’s recent update to its terms of service is a step towards greater clarity and security in this rapidly advancing field.