Disney, NBCU in AI copyright complaint
June 12, 2025
By Colin Mann
The Walt Disney Company and NBCUniversal have filed a lawsuit against AI company Midjourney, claiming that the company’s image-generating service infringes on their copyrighted works. The action, filed in the US District Court in Los Angeles, represents the first significant lawsuit studios have initiated against an AI company.
They accuse Midjourney of using a range of characters, including Spider-Man, Darth Vader, Princess Elsa from Frozen, the Minions, Homer Simpson, Deadpool and Wolverine, and more via an online service that allows users to create images.
“For more than 100 years, Disney and Universal have delighted audiences around the world by investing in and fostering American creative innovation and producing some of the greatest motion pictures and fictional characters of all time,” states the lawsuit. “Midjourney, however, seeks to reap the rewards of Plaintiffs’ creative investment by selling an artificial intelligence (AI) image-generating service (Image Service) that functions as a virtual vending machine, generating endless unauthorised copies of Disney’s and Universal’s copyrighted works.”
The studios allege that by helping itself to their copyrighted works, and then distributing images mages (and soon videos) that blatantly incorporate and copy their famous characters—without investing a penny in their creation—Midjourney is the quintessential copyright free-rider and a bottomless pit of plagiarism. “Piracy is piracy, and whether an infringing image or video is made with AI or another technology does not make it any less infringing,” they assert.
The startup made $300 million in revenue in 2024, according to the lawsuit, with its 21 million users, paying $10 to $120 monthly, according to the lawsuit, to view and download copies and derivatives of the Plaintiffs’ “valuable copyrighted characters”.
Disney and NBCU said they asked the company to stop using their work, but Midjourney failed to do so, going on to release new versions of its Image Service.
“Our world-class IP is built on decades of financial investment, creativity and innovation—investments only made possible by the incentives embodied in copyright law that give creators the exclusive right to profit from their works,” said Horacio Gutierrez, senior executive vice president, chief legal and compliance officer at Disney. “We are bullish on the promise of AI technology and optimistic about how it can be used responsibly as a tool to further human creativity. But piracy is piracy, and the fact that it’s done by an AI company does not make it any less infringing.”
“Creativity is the cornerstone of our business,” asserted Kim Harris, executive vice president and general counsel of NBCUniversal. “We are bringing this action today to protect the hard work of all the artists whose work entertains and inspires us and the significant investment we make in our content. Theft is theft regardless of the technology used, and this action involves blatant infringement of our copyrights.”
The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages and “permanent injunctive relief” to cease the use of the characters.
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