The case is a part of a wave of lawsuits against OpenAI over data used to train generative AI systems.Five Canadian news media companies have filed a legal action against ChatGPT owner OpenAI, accusing the artificial intelligence company of regularly breaching copyright and online terms of use.
The case, filed on Friday, is part of a wave of lawsuits against OpenAI and other tech companies by authors, visual artists, music publishers and other copyright owners over data used to train generative AI systems. Microsoft is OpenAI’s major backer.
In a statement, Torstar, Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, and CBC/Radio-Canada said OpenAI was scraping large swaths of content to develop its products without getting permission or compensating content owners.
“Journalism is in the public interest. OpenAI using other companies’ journalism for their own commercial gain is not. It’s illegal,” they said.
A New York federal judge dismissed a lawsuit on November 7 against OpenAI that claimed it misused articles from news outlets Raw Story and AlterNet.
In an 84-page statement of claim filed in Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice, the five Canadian companies demanded damages from OpenAI and a permanent injunction preventing it from using their material without consent.
“Rather than seek to obtain the information legally, OpenAI has elected to brazenly misappropriate the News Media Companies’ valuable intellectual property and convert it …
