YouTube creators whose videos were downloaded for AI training may be covered by a proposed class action alleging Runway AI bypassed YouTube’s technological protections to scrape their videos for its Gen-3 video model. A federal judge denied Runway’s motion to dismiss on October 30, 2026. No class has been certified and there is nothing to file yet.
Allegations Only · No Settlement Yet
This article describes a class action complaint. The statements below are unproven allegations. Runway AI has not been found liable, there is no certified class, and nothing to claim at this time. This page is informational and is not legal advice.
What Happened?
On October 30, 2026, Judge Lewis A. Kaplan of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York denied Runway AI’s motion to dismiss the consolidated class action complaint in Ace Cam, Inc. v. Runway AI, Inc., No. 1:26-cv-01362. The ruling lets the case move forward; it is not a finding that Runway broke the law.The lawsuit claims Runway violated the anti-circumvention provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 1201, by getting around the measures YouTube uses to stop bulk downloading so it could copy creators’ videos and use them to train its Gen-3 text-to-video and image-to-video model. Runway argued that the law does not apply because anyone can watch YouTube videos for free, and it asked the court to dismiss the case with prejudice. It has not been found to have done anything wrong.
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What the Creators Allege
The consolidated complaint says YouTube lets the public stream videos inside its own player but uses five technical measures to keep anyone from pulling out the underlying video files: a rolling cipher that withholds a usable file address until a scrambled signature is unlocked, IP blocking and rate limits that cut off unusually heavy traffic, session-bound links that stop working when a viewing session ends, CAPTCHA challenges triggered by automated activity, and proof-of-origin tokens meant to confirm that requests come from YouTube’s own player. YouTube’s terms of service also bar scraping and automated downloading.The creators allege Runway got around those measures. They say it used the open-source downloader yt-dlp to defeat the rolling cipher, kept retrieving files after session authorizations had lapsed, and rotated through IP addresses with virtual machines and proxy services so YouTube would not detect and block the downloads. The files were then fed into Runway’s training pipeline, the creators allege, without permission from YouTube or the people who made the videos.
Much of the factual basis comes from a July 2024 report by the technology news site 404 Media, which the complaint cites. It describes an internal spreadsheet listing about 3,968 YouTube channels and more than 100,000 videos that, the complaint alleges, Runway compiled as training material, and a former employee’s account of how the videos were downloaded. Runway has not been found to have done any of this.
The creators also point to a YouTube setting that lets them choose whether third-party companies may train AI on their videos. The complaint says the setting is off by default and that Runway is one of the companies listed in it, so a creator would have had to opt in for Runway to have permission.
As for harm, the creators claim lost advertising and YouTube Premium revenue, lost views and watch hours that count toward joining YouTube’s Partner Program, lost algorithmic reach, a lost market for licensing their videos, and the loss of control over their work.
Why the Judge Denied Dismissal
At this stage a court assumes the complaint’s factual allegations are true and asks only whether they state a legal claim, so the October 30 opinion does not decide whether Runway actually did what the creators allege. Runway made three main arguments, and Judge Kaplan rejected each one for now.• Public videos. Runway argued that a work anyone can watch for free with a web browser cannot be protected by an access control, which it said requires something like a password, paywall or encryption. The judge disagreed, writing that scrambling and encryption are examples of access controls, not an exhaustive list, and that “the public nature of content that has been uploaded to YouTube does not render it unprotected because the public’s viewership of the content necessarily is subject to YouTube’s TPMs.”
• Copy controls versus access controls. Runway said YouTube’s measures only stop downloading, which falls under ordinary copyright law with its fair-use defense rather than under Section 1201(a). The court found the creators had plausibly alleged the measures control access, noting allegations that YouTube cuts off delivery, including ordinary playback, to users who fail its checks, and citing an appeals court ruling that one measure can serve as both an access control and a copy control. It concluded the creators had plausibly alleged that Runway’s bulk downloading bypassed at least one of the five measures.
• Who controls the measures. Runway argued the statute requires the copyright owner to have authority over the protection. The judge said the law does not require creators to put the measures in place themselves, and that the creators plausibly alleged they authorized YouTube to deploy them when they uploaded their videos.
The ruling follows earlier decisions in the same court declining to dismiss similar YouTube stream-ripping claims against Uncharted Labs, the company behind the Suno AI music app. Runway’s briefs point out that Yout v. Recording Industry Association of America, a 2022 Connecticut decision the judge relied on, is on appeal at the Second Circuit, which could shape how these cases end up.
Why the Claim Is Under the DMCA
Most YouTube videos are never registered with the U.S. Copyright Office, and registration is normally required before a copyright owner can sue for infringement. Section 1201 works differently: it targets the act of breaking through a technological measure that controls access to a copyrighted work, and the creators argue it does not require registration. That is why the case is framed around how Runway allegedly obtained the files rather than around what its model produces.The complaint asks for statutory damages, an injunction against further circumvention, and attorneys’ fees. Under 17 U.S.C. § 1203, a court may award statutory damages of $200 to $2,500 per act of circumvention. Those figures describe what the law allows a court to award; they are not an estimate of what any creator would receive.
How the Case Got Here
• February 18, 2026: The first complaint is filed in the Southern District of New York. Two days later the court substitutes Ace Cam, Inc. as the named plaintiff.• February 27, 2026: A second creator suit, Businessing LLC v. Runway AI, Inc., No. 1:26-cv-01655, is filed in the same court.
• March 27, 2026: Judge Kaplan consolidates the two cases and appoints Tom Kherkher of Ellzey Kherkher Sanford Montgomery LLP and Gary Klinger of Milberg, PLLC as interim co-lead class counsel. Runway did not oppose the motion.
• April 27, 2026: The plaintiffs file a consolidated class action complaint.
• May 27, 2026: Runway moves to dismiss.
• June 9, 2026: A third related case, No. 1:26-cv-04360, is consolidated into the lead case.
• October 30, 2026: The court denies Runway’s motion to dismiss.
Runway is one of several AI developers facing parallel creator suits under Section 1201, alongside cases against companies including Nvidia, Snap, ByteDance and Apple. While the motion was pending, the Runway plaintiffs sent the court decisions from those suits, including an order denying Snap’s motion to dismiss in a case brought by Ted Entertainment and other creators, and filings from cases against ByteDance and Apple.
Who Could Be Included
The original complaint proposed a nationwide class of all persons and entities in the United States who are creators or rights holders of YouTube-hosted videos that Runway accessed at the file level by scraping, downloading or otherwise extracting the underlying files through circumvention of YouTube’s technological protection measures. Runway’s officers and directors, its affiliates and the judges on the case are excluded.The class definition can change, and no class exists until the court certifies one. The complaint says membership could be identified from Runway’s and YouTube’s records.
What Happens Next
With the motion to dismiss denied, the case moves toward Runway’s answer to the complaint and discovery. The plaintiffs would then have to ask the court to certify the class. There is no settlement, no claim form and no deadline for creators to act on.Questions
Can YouTube creators file a claim against Runway?
No. There is no settlement, no claim form and no certified class. The October 30, 2026 ruling only means the lawsuit can move forward; it is not a finding that Runway did anything wrong. If the case later settles or a class is certified, notice would come from the court-approved process.
What does the DMCA anti-circumvention law cover?
Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act makes it unlawful to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a copyrighted work. It is separate from ordinary copyright infringement, which is why the creators argue their claim does not depend on whether their videos were registered with the Copyright Office. Section 1203 lets a court award statutory damages of $200 to $2,500 per act of circumvention.
Who is in the proposed class?
The original complaint proposed a nationwide class of people and entities in the United States who are creators or rights holders of YouTube-hosted videos that Runway allegedly accessed at the file level by circumventing YouTube’s technological protection measures. The class definition can change before the plaintiffs ask the court to certify it.
How is this different from the other YouTube AI-scraping lawsuits?
Several YouTube creators have brought similar Section 1201 suits against other AI developers, including Nvidia, Meta, Snap, ByteDance, Apple, OpenAI and Amazon. The Runway plaintiffs told the court about rulings in some of those cases, including an order denying Snap’s motion to dismiss. Each case turns on its own allegations about how the videos were obtained.
What does Runway say in its defense?
Runway argues that YouTube videos are publicly available to anyone with a web browser, so YouTube’s anti-downloading measures are at most copy controls governed by ordinary copyright law, not access controls under Section 1201(a). It also argues the creators lack authority over YouTube’s measures. The judge rejected those arguments at the pleading stage on October 30, 2026, but Runway can raise them again later in the case.
Sources
• Ace Cam, Inc. v. Runway AI, Inc., No. 1:26-cv-01362-LAK (S.D.N.Y.), docket• Class action complaint, Dkt. 1, filed February 18, 2026
• Plaintiffs’ motion to consolidate and appoint interim co-lead class counsel, Dkt. 9, filed March 11, 2026, and the order granting it, Dkt. 26, entered March 27, 2026
• Consolidated class action complaint, Dkt. 33, filed April 27, 2026
• Order consolidating No. 1:26-cv-04360, Dkt. 40, entered June 9, 2026
• Plaintiffs’ opposition to the motion to dismiss, Dkt. 41, filed June 26, 2026
• Runway AI’s reply in support of its motion to dismiss, Dkt. 42, filed July 13, 2026
• Memorandum opinion denying Runway AI’s motion to dismiss, Dkt. 61, entered October 30, 2026
• 17 U.S.C. §§ 1201 and 1203
