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United States of America: Issued District Court of Virginia ruling rejecting AI system as inventor (Thaler v USPTO)

Policy overview

Description

Issued District Court of Virginia ruling rejecting AI system as inventor (Thaler v USPTO)

On 2 September 2021, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled in favour of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in Thaler v. Hirshfeld, stating that artificial intelligence (AI) cannot be listed as an invento…

Scope

Policy Area
Intellectual property
Policy Instrument
Copyright protection regulation
Regulated Economic Activity
ML and AI development
Implementation Level
national
Government Branch
judiciary
Government Body
court

Complete timeline of this policy change

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2019-08-12
under investigation

On 12 August 2019, a copyright claim for a work generated by an artificial intelligence (AI) system…

2020-03-30
under investigation

On 30 March 2020, the US Copyright Office rejected for the second time a copyright claim for a work…

2021-09-02
under investigation

On 2 September 2021, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled in favour of …

2022-02-14
in force

On 14 February 2022, the Review Board of the US Copyright Office rejected a request to review its d…

2022-08-05
in force

On 5 August 2022, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its decision on Thaler v. …

2023-04-24
in force

On 24 April 2023, the US Supreme Court denied the petition filed by Stephen Thaler to hear a challe…

2023-08-18
in force

On 18 August 2023, the US District Court for the District of Columbia issued its ruling in a lawsui…

2025-03-18
in force

On 18 March 2025, the Columbia District Court of Appeals upheld the United States Copyright Office’…

2026-03-02
in force

On 2 March 2026, the Supreme Court of the United States denied a petition for a writ of certiorari …