US music publishers and European music rights orgs have previously filed similar claims against Suno
The Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada sued artificial intelligence music generator Suno on Wednesday, alleging the company infringed on its members’ copyright by using their music to train Suno’s AI model, which Suno users can then use to generate similar or identical compositions.
Filed in the Federal Court, SOCAN’s statement of claim offers several examples of the alleged infringement. These include Suno-generated songs that are “virtually identical” to Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now” and Rascal Flatts’ cover of Canadian singer-songwriter Tom Cochrane’s “Life is a Highway.” The filing also cited a K-pop remix of Avril Lavigne’s “Sk8er Boi.”
SOCAN, which advocates on behalf of more than 185,000 musicians and publishers, claims Suno knows it cannot use SOCAN members’ music for commercial purposes without a license. The Canadian nonprofit asked the Federal Court for a permanent injunction to stop Suno’s alleged copyright infringement, damages, and part of the profits Suno has generated from its alleged copyright infringement activity.
The lawsuit was filed the same week that American singer-songwriter Jason Isbell and three other musicians filed a proposed class action against Suno in US federal court, claiming the company allows its users to copy artists’ musical likeness without permission.
Speaking about the Canadian lawsuit this week, SOCAN chief legal officer and general counsel Andrea Kokonis told Canadian Lawyer that “songwriters and composers aren't afraid of AI. In fact, often they’re the early adopters of new technology. They’re already using AI as a creative tool and exploring its possibilities.”
However, she argues “they need to be paid when their songs are used.”
Kokonis says SOCAN’s lawsuit aims to send “a clear signal to AI services or AI platforms that there are consequences when they use music without permission.”
A spokesperson for Suno said the company is reviewing the statement of claim but did not immediately provide a comment.
Launched in 2023, Suno, which is currently valued at US$5.4 billion, can be accessed via both web browsers and a mobile app. SOCAN alleges the company’s AI model is trained on “virtually all musical files of reasonable quality that are accessible on the internet... through mass ingestion, copying, and processing of those files, all without permission from rightsholders.”
SOCAN says its members’ works “comprise virtually all copyright-protected musical works in current use in Canada.”
In a LinkedIn post earlier this year, Suno cofounder Mikey Shulman said the company had two million paid subscribers and US$300 million in annual revenue.
SOCAN alleges that Suno infringed on its performing rights, which is part of the copyright in a musical work, by making its members’ music available for Suno users to help generate their own works. The nonprofit also claims that Suno infringed on its performing rights by making its AI-generated works available for public streaming, allowing those works to be uploaded to third-party streaming platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube, and letting users create remixes of existing songs.
“Suno encourages, or at least exhibits indifference to, the infringing behaviour of its users, purporting to hide behind its terms of use rather than taking proactive steps to operate in a lawful manner," SOCAN claims.
SOCAN alleges that Suno’s recent introduction of guardrails to prevent copyright infringement “are woefully inadequate.”
"From the outset, Suno has intentionally built its business on the backs of music creators, music publishers, and other rightsholders,” SOCAN’s lawsuit alleges.
"This litigation is a natural consequence of that calculated course of action."
Suno is currently facing other lawsuits in the US, including complaints filed by Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group, and independent music publisher Round Hill Music. The company settled a lawsuit with Warner Music Group last year.
In Europe, the company has been sued by Danish music rights organization Koda, and a German court ruled in favour of German performing rights society GEMA in July in its copyright infringement lawsuit against the AI company.
