YouTubers sue Snap for alleged copyright infringement in training its AI models

A group of YouTubers suing tech giants for scrapping their videos without permission to train AI models have now added Snap to their list of defendants. The plaintiffs — internet content creators behind a trio of YouTube channels with about 6.2 million collective subscribers — allege that Snap trained its AI systems on their video content for use in AI features like the app’s “Imagine Lens,” which lets users edit images using text prompts.

The plaintiffs have previously filed similar lawsuits Nvidia, Meta, and ByteDance about similar matters.

In the newly filed proposed class action suitFiled Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, the YouTubers specifically call out Snap for its use of a large-scale video language data set known as HD-VILA-100Mand others designed for academic and research purposes only. To use these data sets for commercial purposes, the plaintiffs allege that Snap circumvented YouTube’s technology restrictions, terms of service, and licensing restrictions, which prohibit commercial use.

The lawsuit seeks statutory damages and a permanent injunction to stop the alleged copyright infringement in the future.

The business itself is run by the creators behind the h3h3 YouTube channel, with 5.52 million subscribers, and the smaller golf channels MrShortGame Golf and Golfoholics.

It is now one of several lawsuits facing content creators against AI model providers, including copyright disputes from publishers, authors, newspapers, user-generated content sites, artists and more. It is too not the first case comes from a YouTuber. According to the nonprofit Copyright Alliance, more than 70 cases of copyright infringement Reports have been filed against AI companies.

In some cases, such as the one between Meta and a group of authors, a judge has ruled in favor of the tech giant. In other cases, such as the case between Anthropic and a group of authors, the AI ​​giant has settled with the plaintiffs and paid out to resolve their claims. Many cases are still actively litigated.

Snap was asked for comment. TechCrunch will update if one is offered.