The Walt Disney Co. signage on the ground of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, US, on Wednesday, May 7, 2025.
Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The Walt Disney Company sent a cease and desist letter to Character.AI final week, warning the artificial intelligence startup to cease utilizing copyrighted characters with out authorization, a Disney spokesperson confirmed to CNBC on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for Character.AI stated it eliminated the characters talked about within the letter, and that “it’s always up to rightsholders to decide how people may interact with their IP.”
The spokesperson acknowledged that whereas some characters on its platform are fully unique creations, others are “inspired by existing characters that people love.”
“We want to partner with the industry and rightsholders to empower them to bring their characters to our platform,” the Character.AI spokesperson instructed CNBC. “Our goal is to give IP owners the tools to create controlled, engaging and revenue-generating experiences from deep fandom for their characters and stories, expanding their reach using our new, interactive format.”
The letter serves as the newest instance of how media firms like Disney are working to defend their mental property in the course of the AI growth.
Disney is already concerned in an ongoing lawsuit towards AI picture creator Midjourney, alleging that the corporate improperly used and distributed AI-generated characters from motion pictures like “Cars,” “Toy Story,” “Shrek,” “The Avengers” and others.
Axios first reported the cease and desist letter.
Character.AI permits customers to create and work together with character-based chatbots. Google inked a $2.7 billion licensing deal with Character.AI and employed its founders in 2024, and the startup turned embroiled in a wrongful dying lawsuit that very same 12 months.
The household of Sewell Setzer III, a 14-year-old boy in Florida, alleged he dedicated suicide after he turned addicted to speaking with a variety of AI chatbots on the app. One of the chatbots was named Daenerys Targaryen, or Dany, who’s a character within the present “Game of Thrones,” in accordance to the lawsuit.
Character.AI isn’t the one AI firm that is confronted scrutiny over its method to IP.
Earlier this month, a federal decide preliminarily approved Anthropic’s provide to pay $1.5 billion to settle a class motion lawsuit with a group of authors, who claimed that the corporate had illegally downloaded their books and others from pirated databases.
If you’re having suicidal ideas or are in misery, contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for help and help from a educated counselor.
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