On March 2, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its refusal to hear a case concerning whether AI-generated works can be protected by copyright. This decision upholds the U.S. judicial system's consistent stance that copyright protection is limited to works created by humans, dealing another legal setback to efforts seeking intellectual property protection for AI-generated works.

The AI copyright dispute originated with computer scientist Stephen Thaler, who sought copyright registration for a visual artwork titled A Recent Entrance to Paradise, created by his self-developed AI system DABUS. Thaler listed the AI as the author in the application.

However, the U.S. Copyright Office rejected the registration application on the grounds that the work lacked a human author. Thaler subsequently filed an administrative lawsuit. In 2023, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia upheld the Copyright Office's decision in Thaler v. Perlmutter, ruling that under the text and structure of the Copyright Act of 1976 and established judicial interpretations, copyright protection requires the existence of a human author. In 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the lower court ruling, confirming that works generated entirely by AI without human creative involvement are ineligible for copyright protection under the current legal framework.

To overturn these rulings, Thaler filed a petition for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court in October 2025, requesting the Court to review the case. In his petition, Thaler argued that the Copyright Act itself does not explicitly require authors to be natural persons. The Copyright Office's practice of requiring “human authorship” for registration expands the scope of legal interpretation and conflicts with established judicial principles that copyright law should evolve with technological advancements.

On March 2, 2026, the Supreme Court decided not to hear the case. Regarding this outcome, Thaler and his legal team stated: “Even if the Supreme Court were to overturn the Copyright Office's review standards in future cases, it would be too late. During these critical years of AI development, the Copyright Office's approach has already caused irreversible negative impacts on the development and application of artificial intelligence within the creative industries.”