Disney and Universal sue AI firm Midjourney over ‘bottomless pit of plagiarism’

Disney and Universal have filed a landmark lawsuit against AI image generator Midjourney, accusing the San Francisco-based company of large-scale copyright infringement and calling its tools a “bottomless pit of plagiarism”.

The entertainment giants allege that Midjourney’s AI model, which creates high-quality visuals from text prompts, unlawfully copied and distributed images of iconic characters including Darth Vader, Yoda, Elsa, Shrek, Iron Man, and the Minions. Filed in federal court in Los Angeles, the suit marks one of the most aggressive legal actions yet taken by Hollywood against the fast-growing generative AI industry.

“Piracy is piracy,” said Disney’s chief legal officer, Horacio Gutierrez, “and the fact that it’s done by an AI company does not make it any less infringing.” NBCUniversal’s general counsel Kim Harris echoed the concern, adding that the lawsuit aims to protect the creative work and investment of the studios and artists they represent.

According to the complaint, Midjourney’s training data included millions of images scraped from the internet without permission—a practice confirmed by founder David Holz in a 2022 interview. The studios claim Midjourney rebuffed requests to stop using their intellectual property or to implement safeguards that would prevent users from generating infringing content.

The studios have filed for a preliminary injunction to block Midjourney from offering its image and video generation services unless it adopts tools to prevent the unauthorised replication of copyrighted content. They are also seeking unspecified financial damages.

Midjourney, which generated $300 million in revenue last year through paid subscriptions, has not yet commented on the suit. However, the company has faced similar legal challenges before. A prior lawsuit filed by a group of visual artists remains ongoing, with a judge last year ruling that the artists’ claim—that Midjourney stored and reused their copyrighted works without consent—was “plausible”.

This latest action underscores growing tensions between creative industries and AI developers, as generative models increasingly encroach on areas previously protected by intellectual property law. The entertainment industry, in particular, has moved swiftly in recent months to push back against what it sees as widespread appropriation of its copyrighted content. In parallel lawsuits, major record labels, authors, and news organisations have taken similar action against AI companies accused of training models on protected materials without consent or compensation.

The legal outcome of Disney and Universal’s case could set a critical precedent for how AI tools are developed and monetised—and whether or not training models on copyrighted content constitutes fair use or infringement.

While some media companies, including The Guardian and Axel Springer, have opted to license their archives to AI firms, others, like The New York Times, have launched lawsuits against OpenAI and Microsoft for similar unauthorised use.

For now, the case marks a pivotal test of whether courts will draw a firm line on copyright protection in the age of artificial intelligence—or whether companies like Midjourney can continue scraping and generating from vast libraries of human-made work with limited accountability.