Meta Platforms has requested a United States court to dismiss a lawsuit accusing the company of illegally downloading and distributing thousands of adult content files to train its artificial intelligence (AI) systems.
The lawsuit, filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of California, alleges that Meta engaged in unauthorized use of adult content. However, in its motion to dismiss, Meta argues that there is no evidence supporting these claims. The company states that there is no proof that its AI models contain or were trained using the disputed content, noting that these actions were part of broader efforts to develop multimodal artificial intelligence systems.
The plaintiff, Strike 3, is an adult film holding company based in Miami. It distributes content under brands like Vixen, Tushy, and Blacked, among others. Strike 3 claims that Meta illegally downloaded thousands of its adult films to aid AI training.
Meta’s motion challenges this assertion by pointing out inconsistencies in the scale and pattern of the alleged downloads. Over the past seven years, only 157 adult content files produced by Strike 3 were allegedly downloaded using Meta’s corporate IP addresses. This averages to about 22 downloads per year spread across 47 different IP addresses.
Angela Dunning, Meta’s attorney, described the lawsuit as stemming from “meager, uncoordinated activity” by “disparate individuals.” She stressed that the downloads were for personal use and not part of any corporate effort by Meta to collect data for AI training, contradicting Strike 3’s allegations.
The motion also disputes Strike 3’s claim that Meta used more than 2,500 hidden third-party IP addresses. Meta notes that Strike 3 failed to verify these addresses and made loose correlations instead. For example, one IP range allegedly connected to Meta actually belongs to a Hawaiian nonprofit with no ties to the company, while others have no identifiable owners.
Meta further argues there is no evidence showing the company was aware of the alleged downloads or that it could have prevented them. The company stated it gained no benefit from these downloads and that monitoring every file across its global network would be impractical and is not legally required.
Dermot McGrath, co-founder of venture capital firm Ryzen Labs, commented on the case, saying, “If Meta admitted the data was used in models, they’d have to argue fair use, justify the inclusion of pirated content, and open themselves to discovery of their internal training and audit systems.” He added that rather than acknowledging the use of the data, Meta has chosen to deny it completely.
However, McGrath warns that if the court accepts Meta’s defense, it could create “a massive loophole” in copyright protection related to AI training data. This could require future plaintiffs to provide stronger evidence of corporate direction—evidence that companies might become more adept at hiding.
There are also legitimate reasons for the use of explicit content in AI development. Some companies use such content to build safety or moderation tools. McGrath noted, “Most major AI companies have ‘red teams’ whose job is to probe models for weaknesses by using harmful prompts and trying to get the AI to generate explicit, dangerous, or prohibited content.”
As the case develops, it highlights the complex intersection of copyright law and artificial intelligence, raising important questions about data use, corporate responsibility, and legal accountability in the age of AI.
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