OpenAI and Microsoft sued by NYT for copyright infringement

On Wednesday, The New York Times filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging the use of millions of the newspaper’s articles without permission to train chatbots to provide information to their users.

The Times said that it is the first major U.S. media organisation to take legal action against OpenAI, the developer of the widely-used artificial intelligence platform ChatGPT, and Microsoft, an investor in OpenAI and the creator of the AI platform now named Copilot. The lawsuit revolves around copyright concerns related to the use of The New York Times’ content. In addition, various writers and individuals have initiated legal actions to restrict the scraping, or automatic data collection, by AI services, which involves their online content without appropriate compensation.

The newspaper’s complaint, filed in Manhattan federal court, accused OpenAI and Microsoft of trying to “free-ride on The Times’s massive investment in its journalism” by using it to provide alternative means to deliver information to readers.

The Times stated that utilising The Times’s content without payment to develop products that serve as substitutes and divert audiences from The Times is not considered ‘transformative.’ OpenAI and Microsoft, on the other hand, contend that employing copyrighted works for training AI products falls under “fair use,” a legal principle overseeing the unlicensed utilisation of copyrighted material.

According to the U.S. Copyright Office’s website, uses that are deemed “transformative” involve incorporating “something new, with a further purpose or character,” making them “more likely to be considered fair.”

The Times has not specified a particular amount of damages but estimated them in the “billions of dollars.” Additionally, The Times is requesting that OpenAI and Microsoft destroy chatbot models and training sets that include its material.