Infringement case against OpenAI failed because there was no copyright registration

Thinking about suing an AI company for copyright infringement? Do not overlook the basics. Before any court will consider the merits of an infringement claim, the plaintiff needs to have an actual copyright registration in hand, not just a pending application.

That notion was confirmed in a recent unsuccessful lawsuit against OpenAI in federal court in California. Plaintiff sued OpenAI alleging that OpenAI infringed the copyright in several artificial intelligence models and content plaintiff claimed to have developed and then destroyed evidence to conceal that alleged infringement.

Plaintiff asked the court to issue a temporary restraining order preventing defendant from deleting or altering data and documents related to the alleged infringement while the case proceeded. The court denied the request for a temporary restraining order and dismissed the complaint.

The court ruled this way because the Copyright Act bars any civil infringement action until copyright registration has been made, and courts interpret that requirement to mean the Copyright Office must have issued a registration certificate, not merely received an application. This left plaintiff in this case unable to show a likelihood of success on the merits.

Gholami v. OpenAI, Inc., No. 26-cv-00174, 2026 WL 61359 (N.D. Cal., January 8, 2026).

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