German Court Rules OpenAI Infringed Copyright with Song Lyrics in AI Training

Landmark Copyright Ruling in Munich

The Munich Regional Court delivered a significant ruling on Tuesday, November 11, 2025, finding that OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot infringed German copyright law. The court determined that OpenAI utilized protected song lyrics to train its artificial intelligence models without obtaining the necessary licenses, a decision that could have far-reaching implications for the use of copyrighted material by AI systems across Europe.

GEMA's Successful Legal Challenge

The lawsuit was brought by GEMA, the German music rights society representing approximately 100,000 composers, lyricists, and music publishers. GEMA initiated the case in November 2024, alleging that OpenAI's models had harvested and learned from protected lyrics by popular artists. The court sided with GEMA, ruling that both the memorization of the lyrics within the language models and their subsequent reproduction in the chatbot's outputs constituted copyright infringement. The case specifically involved nine German songs, including well-known hits like Herbert Grönemeyer's 'Männer' and Helene Fischer's 'Atemlos Durch die Nacht'.

Court Rejects OpenAI's Arguments

OpenAI had argued that its language models absorbed entire training sets of data rather than storing or copying specific songs, and that the output generated by ChatGPT was the responsibility of the user. However, the Munich court rejected these arguments, asserting that the company was not entitled to use the song lyrics without licenses and that the artists were entitled to compensation. The presiding judge ordered OpenAI to pay undisclosed damages for the unauthorized use of copyrighted material and mandated the disclosure of details regarding the use of the lyrics and any generated profits.

Implications and Reactions

This ruling is being hailed as a landmark European decision and a crucial precedent for how AI companies will be required to handle copyrighted content in their training data. Dr. Tobias Holzmüller, GEMA's CEO, welcomed the decision, stating, 'The internet is not a self-service store, and human creative achievements are not free templates.' OpenAI has expressed its disagreement with the ruling and is currently considering its next steps, including a potential appeal. The company stated that 'The decision is for a limited set of lyrics and does not impact the millions of people, businesses and developers in Germany that use our technology every day.'