What are the copyright risks of using AI-generated images and text for commercial projects?

The main copyright risks with AI-generated content are that you cannot fully own AI-created works in most jurisdictions, and AI tools may inadvertently reproduce copyrighted material from their training data. In the US, the Copyright Office has repeatedly ruled that purely AI-generated works lack the "human authorship" required for copyright protection — a 2023 ruling on an AI-generated comic book confirmed this. That means if you use an AI image for your logo, a competitor could legally copy it and you'd have little recourse. Text is murkier. Most AI platforms (like ChatGPT and Claude) grant you commercial usage rights for outputs, but they don't guarantee the output is original. Here's a concrete example: a marketer asked an AI tool to write a product description, and it produced text nearly identical to a competitor's existing copy. The marketer published it, received a DMCA takedown notice, and had to scramble to rewrite everything. The practical tip: run AI-generated text through a plagiarism checker before publishing, and always modify outputs substantially rather than copying them verbatim. For images, add your own design elements or edits to strengthen your ownership claim. For a deeper dive, see our guide on AI content copyright and legal issues. **Related**: Do I own AI-generated content? | Can I use AI images commercially?