Apple responds to YouTube lawsuit, claims public videos are fair game for AI training

Apple Responds to Lawsuit Filed by Three YouTube Channels

Earlier this year, three YouTube channels sued Apple, alleging that the company violated the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) by unlawfully accessing and scraping millions of copyrighted YouTube videos to train its AI models. In a class action lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in April, the owners of the YouTube channels h3h3Productions, MrShortGame Golf, and Golfholics allege that Apple "deliberately circumvented" YouTube's protections against video scraping and "profited substantially" by doing so. Apple's actions were "not only unlawful, but an unconscionable attack on the community of content creators whose content is used to fuel the multi-trillion-dollar generative AI industry without any compensation," the complaint alleged. h3h3Productions is a well-known YouTube channel created by Ethan Klein and Hila Klein, and they later created the H3 Podcast. Their channels have millions of followers, while MrShortGame Golf and Golfholics have hundreds of thousands of followers. The channels filed equivalent lawsuits against Meta, Nvidia, ByteDance, and Snap. Apple responded to the lawsuit this week, according to a court document viewed by MacRumors. In short, Apple said the plaintiffs made the videos publicly available on YouTube and that it was permitted to access the videos under the DMCA. Apple said YouTube's Terms of Service likewise permitted the company to access the videos. "Plaintiffs allege that they posted audiovisual works to YouTube, and that any member of the public can see them there," reads Apple's response. "No password. No payment. No lock. No key. Allegedly, YouTube employs technological measures to prevent unauthorized downloading. But because YouTube provides public access to the videos, the alleged technological measures do not control access to the works, as § 1201(a) requires." Apple said the plaintiffs have ultimately failed to state a claim, and it requested that the court dismiss the lawsuit as a result.

AppleInsider.com

Apple is asking a federal court to dismiss the YouTuber AI training lawsuit, on the grounds that publicly available YouTube videos are lawfully accessible under both the DMCA and YouTube's Terms of Service. In April 2026, a collection of YouTube channels sued Apple, claiming the company had scraped videos from YouTube to train internal AI models. The class-action lawsuit was headed up by Ted Entertainment, owners of the h3h3Productions channels and podcast. Two golf channels, MrShortGameGolf and Golfholics, were also involved. Apple has responded three months later to the suit. According to the court document spotted by MacRumors, Apple argued that the plaintiffs made the videos publicly available on YouTube, and that both the DMCA and YouTube's Terms of Service permitted the company to access them. "Plaintiffs allege that they posted audiovisual works to YouTube, and that any member of the public can see them there," reads Apple's response. "No password. No payment. No lock. No key. Allegedly, YouTube employs technological measures to prevent unauthorized downloading. But because YouTube provides public access to the videos, the alleged technological measures do not control access to the works, as section 1201(a) requires." Apple is requesting the court throw out the lawsuit as the plaintiffs have failed to state a claim.