Sony Music Files Another Lawsuit Against Udio, Alleges AI Music Generator Copied 30,000 Songs to Train Models
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- Sony Music Entertainment filed a new lawsuit against AI music generator Udio on Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging the startup copied 30,117 tracks from artists including Beyoncé, Harry Styles, and Elvis Presley to train its models.
- U.S. District Court Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein last month denied Sony's bid to add the 30,117 tracks to its original June 2024 complaint, prompting the label to file a standalone suit to preserve its copyright claims.
- Sony is seeking at least $150,000 per infringed work and a court order blocking Udio from using its recordings to train future models.
- Udio admitted in an April filing that it trained on copyrighted songs uploaded to YouTube, but argued the process is fair use because it amounts to "a back-end technological process, invisible to the public, in the service of creating an ultimately non-infringing new product."
- Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group, Sony's co-plaintiffs in the original June 2024 suits against both Udio and Suno, have since settled with Udio and entered licensing agreements; Udio is preparing a new industry-backed model for release later this year.
- Sony and Universal remain engaged in active litigation against Udio's rival AI music generator Suno.
Why it matters: Sony is now the lone major label still fighting Udio in court after Universal and Warner settled and signed licensing deals. By demanding at least $150,000 per infringed work and an injunction against further training on 30,117 specific tracks, Sony is pressure-testing whether Udio's fair use defense can hold up at industrial scale rather than abstract principle.
