SOCAN Sues Suno Over AI Music Copyright, Putting Canadian Creators at the Center of a Growing Legal Fight
SOCAN has filed a lawsuit against AI music company Suno in the Federal Court of Canada, alleging that the platform copied copyrighted Canadian music without permission or compensation.
The case adds another major legal challenge to Suno as music rights organizations, record labels and artists continue to question how AI companies use copyrighted music to train their systems and generate new material.
The allegations in the Canadian case have not been proven in court.
SOCAN Names 150 AI-Generated Examples
SOCAN, Canada's largest member-owned music rights organization, says it identified hundreds of Suno outputs containing substantially similar elements to songs in its repertoire.
The lawsuit includes 150 examples, including AI-generated versions of Nickelback's "Photograph," Avril Lavigne's "Sk8terboi" and Tom Cochrane's "Life Is a Highway."
SOCAN has published several of the examples alongside the original recordings. According to the organization, some of the outputs contain similarities in melody, rhythm, chord progressions and lyrics while using different vocal performances.
SOCAN says the examples were available through ordinary use of the Suno platform.
What SOCAN Is Alleging
The lawsuit centers on performing rights in musical works.
SOCAN alleges that Suno allows copyrighted songs to be replicated through AI-generated outputs and then makes those outputs available for streaming on its platform.
The organization also points to Suno's promotion of publishing and sharing AI-generated music, including distribution to platforms such as Spotify, YouTube and Apple Music.
SOCAN is seeking damages and asking the court to require Suno to comply with Canadian copyright law, including measures that would prevent allegedly infringing outputs from being made available.
Suno's Position on AI Training
Suno generates music from text prompts and says its AI models are trained using publicly available music files and related metadata accessible through third-party websites on the open internet.
The company was valued at approximately US$5.4 billion during its latest funding round. Earlier this year, Suno's CEO said the platform had passed two million paid subscribers and had been used by more than 100 million people.
Suno did not respond to requests for comment regarding the Canadian lawsuit by the deadline cited in the report.
Canada's Copyright Framework
The case could also bring more attention to how Canadian copyright law applies to AI training.
Canada does not have a direct equivalent to the U.S. concept of fair use. Instead, Canadian copyright law includes fair dealing provisions that allow certain uses of copyrighted material for specific purposes, including research and private study.
Entertainment lawyer Matthew Gorman said the courts will ultimately need to determine whether existing Canadian copyright principles apply to the use of copyrighted works in AI model training and whether those uses constitute infringement.
The issue remains unsettled as governments, courts, rights organizations and AI companies continue to work through how existing copyright rules apply to generative AI.
Suno Faces Legal Action in the U.S. and Germany
The Canadian lawsuit is part of a wider series of legal disputes involving Suno.
In the United States, Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group and Round Hill Music have filed copyright lawsuits against the company over allegations of large-scale copyright infringement.
Suno has argued that training AI models on publicly available material can qualify as fair use under U.S. copyright law.
The company also faces a proposed class-action lawsuit from singer-songwriter Jason Isbell and three other artists over allegations that Suno commercially exploited their identities without consent.
In Germany, music rights organization GEMA brought a separate case against Suno. A German court recently ruled that Suno had unlawfully used copyrighted works to train its AI music system. Suno has said it disagrees with that ruling.
A Growing Focus on Licensing
SOCAN says it had previously pursued licensing discussions with Suno but was unable to make meaningful progress.
The organization is also working with technology company Musical AI on tools intended to identify the music underlying AI-generated outputs and develop a potential framework for compensating rights holders.
The Canadian case will now put those broader questions before the Federal Court of Canada, including how copyright law should apply when AI systems use existing music as part of their development and when generated music is subsequently distributed commercially.
With similar cases already moving through courts in multiple countries, the decisions could play an important role in shaping how AI music companies, creators and rights holders operate going forward.
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