California Judges Rule AI Training on Books is Fair Use

Two federal judges in California issued preliminary rulings in late June 2025 determining that the use of full books to train artificial intelligence models without permission from authors or publishers is permissible. The courts cited the legal doctrine of fair use, concluding that such training is transformative and does not constitute a mere copy that negatively impacts the commercial market.

While these rulings are fact-specific and currently under appeal, they indicate a significant shift in the legal handling of intellectual property within the AI industry. In response to the aggressive behavior of AI scrapers, Cloudflare announced in July 2025 that it would begin blocking automated bots from scanning and copying content from its customers' websites. The company stated this move was intended to "put the power back in the hands of creators."