A coalition of nearly 400 local and regional newspapers in the US has filed a federal lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging that the companies unlawfully used copyrighted news articles to train their artificial intelligence products, including ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot.
As per media reports, the lawsuit, filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, claims the companies “scraped, copied and ingested” original reporting from hundreds of newspapers without authorisation or compensation. According to the complaint, the alleged use included content behind paywalls and other access restrictions.
The publishers have also accused the companies of violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), alleging that copyright notices, bylines and other rights management information were removed from their content. The coalition is seeking statutory damages and an injunction to prevent further alleged infringement.
Reports also suggest that the case marks the largest coordinated legal action by local newspaper publishers over the use of journalistic content in AI training and adds to a growing list of copyright disputes involving AI companies and media organisations. Previous lawsuits have been filed by publishers including The New York Times Company and several major US newspapers over similar allegations.
OpenAI and Microsoft have previously argued in court that the use of publicly available online material to train AI models constitutes fair use, while maintaining that AI systems benefit creators and publishers by driving new forms of discovery and engagement.
The latest lawsuit is expected to further test the legal boundaries of copyright law in the age of generative AI and could have significant implications for how AI companies access and use published content in the future.
