Artificial intelligence-driven music start-ups Suno and Udio admitted to training their music-generating AI models on copyrighted materials in separate legal filings but, at the same time, said it is lawful under fair-use doctrine. The lawsuits were filed in June by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), a group representing major record labels like Universal Music Group (UMG), Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Records.

The two startups allow AI music generation through text prompts. According to the RIAA, some of these tracks contain vocals that sound identical to those by artistes like Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jackson and ABBA.

The companies have said the lawsuits highlight the music industry’s opposition to competition, according to The Verge. “Helping people generate new artistic expression is what copyright law is designed to encourage, not prohibit,” Udio wrote in its filing. “Under long-standing doctrine, what Udio has done — use existing sound recordings as data to mine and analyse for the purpose of identifying patterns in the sounds of various musical styles, all to enable people to make their own new creations — is a quintessential ‘fair use’ under copyright law.”

Meanwhile, Suno said that major record labels had misconceptions about how its AI music tools work. “What the major record labels really don’t want is competition,” Suno wrote in its filing. “Where Suno sees musicians, teachers and everyday people using a new tool to create original music, the labels see a threat to their market share.”