With the majority of obligations for general-purpose AI (GPAI) models set to take effect on 2 August 2025 (AI Act, Chapter V, Art. 53), the European Commission has published the long-awaited GPAI Code of Practice on 10 July 2025. The document—developed by independent experts—serves as voluntary guidance to help GPAI providers prepare for compliance under the EU AI Act. It focuses on three key areas: Copyright, Transparency, and Safety & Security.

Drawing on intense criticism from online publishers across the European Union (EU) against Generative AI (GAI), the present article aims to highlight the highly debated copyright issue of data collection for Generative AI training. Three questions are therefore addressed: To what extent is scraping data for GAI training considered to be a copyright issue; How Data scraping and data mining are regulated under EU Law and; How the future AI Act intends to deal with the use of training data.

The present contribution provides an overview of two of the most pressing legal questions concerning IP law, authorship of AI-generated works and copyright infringement. It does so through the lens of US copyright law, since US courts have dealt with the highest number of AI art cases, and many AI systems manufacturers and suppliers are based in the US.