Elon Musk Fires Back at Anthropic Over Data Theft Allegations
In a dramatic escalation of tensions within the artificial intelligence sector, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has launched a sharp critique against AI giant Anthropic. This comes just after Anthropic publicly accused several prominent Chinese AI laboratories of systematically stealing data from its flagship Claude model.
Musk's Accusation: A Case of the Pot Calling the Kettle Black?
Taking to his social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, Musk suggested that Anthropic itself is deeply implicated in the very practices it condemns. He pointed to established reports and legal settlements indicating that Anthropic utilized copyrighted books and freely available online data to train its AI models without proper authorization.
"Anthropic is guilty of stealing training data at a massive scale and has had to pay multi-billion dollar settlements for their theft. This is just a fact," Musk wrote unequivocally.
His comments reference a significant $1.5 billion lawsuit settled last year, where Anthropic resolved claims from authors and publishers alleging the unauthorized use of copyrighted literary works for model training.
Anthropic's Allegations Against Chinese AI Rivals
The controversy ignited when Anthropic, in a statement reported by Business Insider, leveled serious accusations against Chinese AI firms DeepSeek, MiniMax, and Moonshot AI. The company alleged these labs orchestrated what it termed "industrial-scale distillation campaigns."
According to Anthropic, these rivals created approximately 24,000 fraudulent Claude accounts, which then generated over 16 million exchanges in clear violation of its terms of service and regional access restrictions.
For context, distillation is a common AI development technique where a smaller model is trained using the outputs of a larger, more sophisticated one. While legitimate, Anthropic contends its Chinese competitors are exploiting this method to illicitly acquire advanced capabilities at a fraction of the time and investment required for independent development.
Geopolitical Tensions and Hypocrisy Claims
Musk's intervention arrives amid heightened geopolitical and commercial friction between U.S. and Chinese AI enterprises. While Anthropic firmly insists its intellectual property is being stolen, critics like Musk highlight the scrutiny American firms themselves face regarding their data sourcing methodologies.
This exchange underscores a broader, contentious debate about ethics, ownership, and competitive practices in the global race for AI supremacy.
Musk's Earlier "Evil" Allegations and Funding Controversy
This is not Musk's first public clash with Anthropic. Earlier this month, he launched a scathing attack, labeling the company's AI models as "misanthropic and evil." These comments were a direct response to Anthropic's announcement of a monumental $30 billion funding round, achieving a staggering $380 billion valuation—one of the largest private tech raises in history.
Anthropic stated the capital would fuel deeper research, product innovation, and infrastructure expansion to make Claude universally accessible. Musk's rebuttal on X alleged severe bias within Anthropic's systems.
"Your AI hates Whites & Asians, especially Chinese, heterosexuals and men. This is misanthropic and evil. Fix it," he wrote, adding a pointed critique of the company's name implying an inevitable ironic fate.
The ongoing saga between Musk, Anthropic, and accused Chinese labs reveals the intense rivalries and ethical quandaries defining the current AI landscape, where accusations of data theft and bias are becoming potent weapons in a high-stakes technological conflict.
