Paramount Sends Cease and Desist Letter to ByteDance Over AI Models

Paramount Skydance Joins Chorus Against ByteDance Over AI Models

Paramount Skydance has become the latest Hollywood studio to voice concerns regarding ByteDance, condemning its AI models, Seedance and Seedream, for allegedly infringing on intellectual property rights.

In a cease and desist letter directed to ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo, Paramount’s attorney emphasized, “We insist that ByteDance immediately take all necessary steps to (i) prevent violations of our intellectual property rights by ensuring that our content is not used or created by ByteDance or the Seed Platforms going forward, and (ii) remove all infringing instances of Paramount’s content from ByteDance’s platforms and systems.”

According to the letter, ByteDance markets its Seed Platforms as tools for generating images and videos based on user prompts. However, the content produced often includes recognizable elements from Paramount’s well-known franchises, which are protected by copyright and trademark laws. The attorney listed several properties, including South Park, SpongeBob SquarePants, Star Trek, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Godfather, Dora the Explorer, and Avatar: The Last Airbender, as having been improperly replicated by the Seed Platforms.

The attorney further asserted that Paramount’s intellectual property was utilized in the development of these models without consent, stating, “Such training was also done without our consent and is a violation of the law.” Paramount categorically opposes the unauthorized use of its protected works, both as training inputs for these AI models and as outputs generated by them.

This action comes amid a growing backlash against ByteDance and its AI technology, particularly following the recent controversy surrounding Seedance 2.0. Disney also sent a cease and desist letter last Friday, addressing similar intellectual property infringement related to its franchises, including Star Wars, Marvel, and Family Guy.

The Motion Picture Association and the Human Artistry Campaign released statements last week condemning ByteDance’s practices, aligning with escalating concerns from various industry leaders regarding the implications of AI-generated content.