OpenAI Faces Billion-Dollar Lawsuit from Canadian Media Outlets Over Copyright Violations

The lawsuit demands billions in damages and content-use restrictions.

By Thea Felicity

Nov 30 2024, 06:50 AM EST

ITALY-TECHNOLOGY-AI — A photo taken on October 4, 2023 in Manta, near Turin, shows a smartphone and a laptop displaying the logos of the artificial intelligence OpenAI research laboratory and ChatGPT robot. MARCO BERTORELLO/AFP via Getty Images

News organizations in Canada are organizing together to file a lawsuit against OpenAI, particularly accusing the ChatGPT AI chatbot for violatiing copyright laws. Among those who filed are prominent Canadian news outlets, like the Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, and CBC.

These Canadian media outlet companies charge that OpenAI committed copyright infringement when it took and used its news reports to train its AI program.

In a joint statement reported by BBC, the media companies explained that OpenAI infringed copyright laws and hurt journalism by manipulating their content for commercial use without permission. OpenAI said its AI models are trained on public data and are aligned with international copyright principles.

The company pointed out its collaboration with publishers, which allows them to opt out of using their content through tools it provides. The Canadian lawsuit claims, however, that OpenAI disregarded safeguards such as paywalls and copyright notices in violating terms of use on their platforms.

Now, the damages are punitive, at C$20,000 (USD$14,000) per article. This could mean billions in compensation.

The coalition of media also seeks to have the court bar the use of their content by OpenAI in the future. Further, they seek OpenAI to share the profits accruing from using the said articles. This is the most significant case so far made for Canadian publishers, also being reportedly the first of its kind in Canada.

This case is not unique to Canada as the same concerns have been raised in the US as well. In fact, OpenAI is also facing similar lawsuits with one failed by New York Times. Other groups, like the Authors Guild, have also raised concerns about the misuse of their content by AI companies.

OpenAI, recently valued at C$219 billion (USD$156 billion) faces increasing scrutiny as it grows over intellectual property rights as more data are being fed into their system. With the amount of money involved, the outcome of this lawsuit could set a precedent for how AI companies interact with content creators and use copyrighted material globally.