Lyrics
protected
despite AI.
Lyrics
protected
despite AI.
by
Are song lyrics still protected if the finished song was produced using Suno? And in a dispute, who has to prove that a human—and not an AI—wrote the lyrics?
One Song, Two Versions, One Suspicion of AI Involvement
In April 2025, a woman wrote—according to her own account—song lyrics based on her own life story. On April 25, 2025, she drafted an initial version, which the court later described as a rough draft. That same day, she revised the lyrics and gave them to her partner, who, as the producer, composed the music. To do so, he used Suno AI, a program that generates complete musical pieces from text input. The song was released in July 2025 via the DistroKid platform.
About three months later, an artist released two versions of a song—including on Spotify—that contained substantial portions of these lyrics. The lyricist filed for a preliminary injunction—that is, a court order issued in summary proceedings. The Frankfurt am Main Regional Court granted the injunction and upheld it in a judgment dated December 17, 2025. The artist filed an appeal.
What the artist objected to
The artist believed the text was generated by AI. She was supported by a third party who had joined the proceedings on her side. An AI-generated text would not be protected by copyright because copyright law applies only to human creations. As evidence, the opposing party submitted a private expert opinion. The expert pointed to a lack of a central theme, a lack of poetic devices, and sentences that made little sense. An AI detector had attributed 77 percent of the text to AI.
In addition, the opposing party raised two further objections. By using Suno, the copywriter had transferred her rights in accordance with the provider’s terms of use. Alternatively, the adaptation was permitted as a pastiche. This is a legal exception that allows certain adaptations of third-party works without consent.
The Frankfurt Higher Regional Court largely upheld the injunction
In its ruling dated October 1, 2026—Case No. 11 U 2/26— the Higher Regional Court of Frankfurt am Main essentially upheld the preliminary injunction. The artist remains prohibited from making the two songs with the lyrics publicly available via digital platforms, as well as from reproducing or editing them. She is also prohibited from advertising the tracks, for example via social media. In addition, she must provide information regarding platforms, revenue, downloads, streams, and involved third parties such as labels or distribution partners.
Why wasn’t Suno important?
The judges expressly left open the question of how significantly Suno had altered the published text. They based their decision solely on the draft version, which they deemed to be a literary work—that is, a text protected by copyright. Its concise, explicit, and striking language underscores the protagonist’s narrative development in a unique way.
In this case, the fact that the “raw version” constitutes a work is decisive and sufficient for a finding of copyright infringement, since relevant elements eligible for copyright protection remain in their unaltered form in the most recent published version.
According to the lyricist, Suno was used solely to adapt the lyrics to the music. The program smoothed out the pronunciation, adjusted the stress patterns, and fine-tuned the entry points. The court did not need to determine whether this was accurate. What matters, the court held, is that the defining elements of the rough draft also reappeared in the artist’s version. In the court’s view, even a relatively small part of a work is sufficient for this purpose, provided it expresses the author’s own intellectual creation.
The Senate rejected the argument regarding the transfer of rights to Suno for the same reason. Suno was not used to create the relevant draft version.
Who Must Prove Human Authorship?
As a general rule, the party asserting laws must demonstrate and prove that the work is of human origin. The court emphasized a specific point: if, given the current state of the art, a text could also have been created by AI, there is no longer a high probability that it is a human creation.
The court left open the question of whether the opposing party must first present concrete evidence of AI use. In any case, the opposing party had done so here with the expert opinion. Therefore, the lyricist had to explain in detail how her work was created. In the opinion of the Higher Regional Court, she succeeded in doing so. Her affidavits and those of her producer were internally consistent. This was supported by the fact that she was identified as the lyricist at the time of publication and, according to her own statements, had also been named as such by GEMA. The fact that she had not published any other works to date was irrelevant. Even a debut work could be protected.
In summary proceedings, a preponderance of probability—in the form of a prima facie case—is sufficient. In main proceedings, stricter evidentiary requirements apply.
How effective are AI detectors in court?
The private expert opinion failed to convince the judges. Without providing detailed justification, they deemed most of the circumstantial evidence implausible. Some pieces of evidence even seemed to point against an AI. An AI works with pattern recognition and therefore relies on known patterns. An unusual structure without a recurring refrain would be inconsistent with this. Likewise, an AI would be more likely to use poetic devices from its database than to avoid them.
The Senate considered the detector’s result of 77 percent to be unfounded. An awkward use of stylistic devices does not call into question the fact that a work is a human creation.
Why did the pastiche objection fail?
Even the pastiche exception did not help the artist. According to this exception, a pastiche encompasses creations that are reminiscent of existing works but are perceptibly different from them and engage in a recognizable artistic or creative dialogue with them. The opposing party failed to explain where and how its song entered into such a dialogue with the text. The comparison of the texts initially reveals only similarities.
What does this mean for musicians and other creative professionals?
The ruling shows that the AI defense can become a common line of defense. The presumption of authorship is called into question by the ruling when it comes to content that is frequently created using AI. Anyone wishing to assert copyright should therefore keep dated drafts, notes, and work-in-progress versions. This can help prove that the content was not generated by AI.
Conclusion
The Frankfurt Higher Regional Court has taken a pragmatic approach. It sidestepped the difficult question of protecting AI-edited texts and focused instead on the original human-written draft. This supports creators who use AI solely as a tool and safeguard their drafts. Equally important is the message to the defense. A detector result without justification is not sufficient.
The fundamental questions remain unresolved. It remains unclear whether and when a text created by a person through multiple inputs into an AI program is protected. It also remains unclear whether the defendant must first provide concrete evidence of AI use. Regarding the issue of the transfer of rights to Suno, the court relied only in the alternative on the producer’s statement that the professional version used was not supposed to contain such a clause.
We’d be happy to
advise you on
Copyright!
