As reported by Yomiuri Shimbun, a subsidiary of major Japanese book distributor Nippan Group Holdings has been found to have sold large volumes of Japanese books to US AI developer Anthropic, the company behind Claude. According to publishing industry insiders, Nippan admitted to making the sales in response to an inquiry lodged by the Japan Book Publishers Association (JBPA). The incident has drawn strong criticism from Japanese publishers, who are concerned that the books may have been destroyed and used for AI training.
The issue came to light through internal Anthropic documents released during a recently concluded class-action suit in the US, which was filed in August 2024 by a group of authors who alleged that the company infringed their copyrights by digitizing and storing large volumes of pirated books. According to the court documents, as part of its “Project Panama,” Anthropic had purchased large quantities of books from book distributors in Europe, the United States, and Asia. Among the companies listed was “Nippan Japan,” which is believed to refer to Nippan.
This revelation was followed by growing backlash among publishers, prompting the JBPA to contact Nippan Group Holdings to ask whether it had sold publications from member publishers to Anthropic and request that the company stop supplying or selling books for the purpose of AI training. In response, Nippan reportedly acknowledged that it had sold books between December 2024 and December 2025, but stated that it had not understood the purchases to be for the purpose of AI training. Details such as the number of volumes, the price, and whether the books were actually used for training remain unverified.
Nippan’s handling of the matter has drawn criticism from publishing industry figures, with an executive quoted by Yomiuri Shimbun commenting, “Nippan is supposed to be in a position to protect Japan’s publishing culture. I cannot forgive it for doing something that could undermine that very culture.”
