A24 made several serious missteps following the release of Backrooms, angering fans by filing copyright claims against other Backrooms creators, before withdrawing them after director Kane Parsons intervened. So, A24 and its partners at Image Nation Studios and Spooky Pictures have been eager to clarify that they are not asserting exclusive rights to the SCP universe. A24 declined to comment, but Monique Levine, a spokesperson for Image Nation and Spooky, told The Verge that “A24’s worldwide rights pertain to the specific film project being produced.”

The problem is, under the license used by the SCP Foundation, nobody can claim exclusive rights to any SCP material. Creative Commons’ CEO Anna Tumadóttir told The Verge that, “Anyone can use works available under Creative Commons ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) license, even commercially,”