The 2025 Copyright Office Report on AI-Generated Works

The rapid advancement of generative AI technologies has raised pressing questions about intellectual property rights in higher education, particularly regarding the ownership of AI-generated content. In January 2025, the U.S. Copyright Office released Part 2 of its report on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence, which directly addresses whether AI-generated works qualify for copyright protection. The report reaffirms that, under current law, works created solely by AI without human intervention are not eligible for copyright protection.

The Copyrightability report clarifies the legal status of AI-generated outputs, emphasizing the longstanding principle that copyright law protects human authorship. This conclusion aligns with previous judicial decisions, most notably the 2023 case of Thaler v. Perlmutter. In this case, the U.S. District Court upheld the Copyright Office’s decision to deny a copyright registration for an image autonomously generated by an AI system, ruling that human creativity is a fundamental requirement for copyright eligibility.

The report underscores the distinction between AI-assisted works and purely AI-generated works:

• AI-Assisted Works: If a human provides creative input and exerts control over the final expression of a work, the human-authored aspects may be eligible for copyright.
• Fully AI-Generated Works: If an AI system creates a work without meaningful human contribution, the work does not qualify for copyright protection.

However…

The U.S. Copyright Office will evaluate each AI-related copyright application on a case-by-case basis, considering the level of human authorship involved in the creation process. The analysis will focus on whether the human contribution is sufficient to meet the legal threshold for originality. The Copyright Office will assess:

1. How Was the Work Created?

The Office will investigate whether the work was entirely AI-generated or if it involved significant human creative input. This includes:

• Fully AI-Generated Work: If the work was produced entirely by AI without human intervention, it will not qualify for copyright protection.
• AI-Assisted Work: If a human meaningfully guided, selected, or modified the output in a creative way, it may qualify for protection only for the human-authored portions.

2. The Role of Prompts in AI-Generated Content

The Copyright Office acknowledges that detailed text prompts can influence AI outputs, but simply writing a prompt does not necessarily constitute authorship. The key question is whether the human controlled the expressive elements of the final work.

• Basic prompts (“Create an oil painting of a cat”) → Not sufficient for copyright.
• Highly detailed, iterative prompts with manual refinement (“Create a surrealist painting of a cat with three eyes, using the color palette of Van Gogh’s Starry Night, and revise until it aligns with my artistic vision”) → May be considered, depending on the level of creative decision-making.

3. Was There a Pre-Existing Human Work?

• If a human-created work (such as a sketch, text, or photograph) was input into an AI tool and used as the basis for the final product, the human-authored portions may be protected.
• If the AI transforms the human work beyond recognition, the human author may not be entitled to copyright over the final AI-generated product.

4. Modification and Selection of AI Outputs

A human may edit, refine, or arrange AI-generated elements in a way that demonstrates creativity. The Copyright Office will assess:

• Did the human select and modify AI-generated content in a meaningful way?
• Did the human arrange AI-generated elements in a creative manner?
• Does the final product demonstrate human originality beyond the AI’s capabilities?

5. Transparency Requirements: Disclosure of AI Use

The Copyright Office requires applicants to disclose AI-generated material in their submissions. If a work contains AI-generated elements, the application must specify:

• What parts of the work were generated by AI.
• How much human modification or selection was involved.
• What specific human creative decisions were made.

If the AI-generated portions are not disclosed, and the work is later found to lack sufficient human authorship, the copyright registration may be canceled.

For further reading, review the full Part 2. U.S. Copyright Office Report on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence

This work was generated in collaboration with ChatGPT, an AI language model developed by OpenAI.