CNN has filed a federal lawsuit accusing Perplexity AI of unlawfully copying and distributing thousands of its news stories, videos, and images to power the startup's artificial intelligence products without permission.
In a complaint lodged in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, CNN alleges that Perplexity scraped more than 17,000 pieces of CNN content, including articles, photos and video clips, to train and operate its AI "answer engine."
The network says the AI system then delivered responses that were "identical or substantially similar" to CNN's original reports, effectively competing with CNN's own platforms, according to Reuters.
CNN argues this conduct violates its copyrights and trademarks because the material was taken and republished without authorization or compensation.
According to court filings and related coverage, CNN claims Perplexity's tools replicate the structure, wording, and editorial choices of CNN stories while sometimes omitting bylines, branding, and context that identify CNN as the source.
The lawsuit contends this deprives CNN of traffic and subscription revenue by giving users fewer reasons to visit CNN's site, apps or channels.
CNN also alleges that Perplexity used content from behind paywalls and internal feeds that CNN provides to partners under separate licensing deals, and that the company ignored CNN's efforts to block unidentified crawlers from harvesting its material.
The case marks CNN's first known copyright and trademark action against an AI company and is believed to be the first such lawsuit brought by a television news network against an AI search or answer engine.
It follows earlier suits against Perplexity by outlets including The New York Times, which in 2025 accused the company of "large-scale, unlawful copying and distribution" of its journalism to power commercial AI products, and by News Corp-owned properties such as Dow Jones and the New York Post over similar claims.
Those complaints also challenge Perplexity's argument that using news content in this way amounts to fair use under US law.
Perplexity has previously defended its model, arguing that facts are not protected by copyright and that its systems transform source material rather than merely reproduce it.
In response to earlier lawsuits, the company has argued that generative AI tools should be allowed to learn from publicly available information, comparing the process to how search engines index the web.
In the CNN case, the company is expected to mount a similar defense focused on fair use and the distinction between copying facts and copying expressive journalism, though detailed court filings from Perplexity in this lawsuit were not yet publicly available at the time of writing, according to The Verge.
Join the Conversation