Anthropic (Claude)

On July 20, 2026 Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin granted final approval to a $1.5 billion settlement - the largest copyright recovery in US history - over books Anthropic downloaded from the shadow libraries LibGen and PiLiMi to train Claude. The certified Works List runs to 482,460 titles at roughly $3,100 each, about four times the $750 statutory minimum for infringement, and Anthropic must destroy the original pirated files. The court overruled all 54 objections and comments, recorded a 91.3% claims rate, and cut class counsel's requested 12.5% fee ($187.5M) to $101.6M as far outside the reasonable range for mega-fund cases - every dollar not paid in fees stays in a non-reversionary fund for authors. Separately, the company reversed its own founding privacy position: consumer chats were explicitly not used for training until August 2025, when Free, Pro and Max users were given until October 8, 2025 to choose a training setting in order to keep using Claude, with retention jumping from 30 days to five years. And the privacy policy makes the ceiling explicit: conversations flagged for safety review can still be used for training regardless of what your opt-out toggle says.

• Severity
• Evidence tierUnassigned
• Claims confirmed
• Last verified2026-08-04

Case status. Private litigation; the legal tier of its sources has not been assigned yet.

Primary source. www.courthousenews.com/anthropic-to-pay-1-5-billion-copyright-settlement-to-authors-publishers/ — Verified - primary source confirmed.

Arbitration

Y - consumer terms include binding arbitration and class action waiver with an opt-out mechanism (verify current window against the live Consumer Terms; the reviewed US version is dated Oct 8 2025). REGULATORY vs PRIVATE distinction: Bartz was a private class action, not a regulator action. No confirmed regulatory enforcement against Anthropic as of this pass; independent legal analysts flagged the Sept 2025 consent UI as a possible GDPR dark-pattern issue but no DPA action had been confirmed.

Contacts

Privacy contact. privacy@anthropic.com (DPO: dpo@anthropic.com)

Legal notice. Not verified this pass. If publicly traded: SEC Form 10-K cover page gives the official corporate address; the Secretary of State business-entity search in the state of incorporation gives the registered agent, which must accept service. If private: the state registered agent is usually the only reliable route.

Mailing address. Anthropic PBC, 548 Market St, PMB 90375, San Francisco, CA 94104, USA (EU: Anthropic Ireland Ltd, 6th Floor, South Bank House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, D04 TR29)