Reddit has filed a lawsuit against AI startup Anthropic for allegedly scraping user comments to train its Claude chatbot, raising major concerns over data privacy.
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| Reddit’s lawsuit against Anthropic highlights growing legal battles over AI training data, platform consent, and ethical use of user-generated content. Image: Reddit |
San Francisco, USA — June 6, 2025:
Reddit has launched a lawsuit against artificial intelligence startup Anthropic, accusing the company of scraping vast quantities of user-generated content to train its Claude AI assistant without authorization. The case, filed in the California Superior Court in San Francisco, marks a significant escalation in legal challenges over how tech firms gather and use public data to develop AI models.
According to the complaint, Anthropic used automated tools to harvest Reddit posts, violating the platform’s terms of service and potentially compromising user privacy. Reddit alleges that this data scraping was done without notifying users or securing consent, an action it describes as unethical and legally indefensible.
“AI companies should not be permitted to extract and use personal content without clear boundaries on how that data is handled,” said Reddit’s Chief Legal Officer, Ben Lee. He noted that Reddit’s official data-sharing partnerships, such as those with Google and OpenAI, include safeguards like user deletion rights and strict limits on data use—measures Reddit claims Anthropic bypassed.
Anthropic, co-founded in 2021 by former OpenAI executives, is the developer of the Claude chatbot and a key AI partner to Amazon. The company denied Reddit’s accusations, stating that it “disagrees with Reddit’s claims and will defend ourselves vigorously.”
Unlike previous AI-related lawsuits that hinge on copyright infringement, Reddit’s case centers on contract violations and unfair business practices. The platform argues that Anthropic breached its terms of use, citing a 2021 academic paper co-authored by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, which identified Reddit communities as valuable data sources for training language models.
Reddit also pointed to Anthropic’s testimony before the U.S. Copyright Office, in which the startup advocated that large-scale use of publicly accessible web data for AI training was legally justified. Reddit contends that this position disregards the platform’s user agreements and the need for consent.
Now a publicly traded company, Reddit has increasingly relied on licensing its data to generate revenue and enforce user protections. This legal move reflects Reddit’s broader push to assert control over its content in an era where user data is a prime asset for AI development.
As the race to build smarter AI continues, Reddit’s lawsuit against Anthropic could set new precedents on the legal and ethical obligations of AI companies sourcing data from online communities.