OpenAI, a major U.S. tech company specialized in Artificial Intelligence (AI), is facing legal challenges regarding copyright claims from major digital news firms in India.
Approximately 20 companies, including the Indian Express, Hindustan Times, NDTV (owned by Gautam Adani), and the Digital News Publishers Association (DNPA) representing major players such as Mukesh Ambani’s Network18, the Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar, Zee News, India Today Group, and The Hindu has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in New Delhi court.
Many of these outlets also have successful newspaper and television operations since decades and are concerned that their news websites are being scraped to store and reproduce their content for users of the powerful AI tool ChatGPT.
As reported by the Indian Express, Reuters was the first media house to cover the digital news publishers’ case filing, which adds to the ongoing legal struggle involving ChatGPT in India. One of the most high-profile lawsuits was filed last year by the local news agency ANI against OpenAI. Additionally, global and Indian book publishers have also joined the fight.
The 135-page case filing in the New Delhi court, which has not been made public but was reviewed by Reuters, argues that OpenAI’s actions pose “a clear and present danger to the valuable copyrights” of DNPA members and other publishers.
Courts worldwide are currently addressing claims from authors, news outlets, and musicians who accuse tech companies of using their copyrighted works to train AI services and are seeking the deletion of content used for training. It has been noted that The Times of India has chosen not to participate in this legal challenge, despite being a DNPA member.
In the U.S., The New York Times has become the first major American media organization to sue OpenAI and similar companies over copyright issues concerning its written works. The lawsuit, filed in the Federal District Court in Manhattan, claims that millions of articles published by The Times were used to train automated chatbots, which now compete with the newspaper as a reliable information source.
The New York Times has raised concerns that when chatbots are asked about current events or newsworthy topics, they can generate responses based on The Times’ journalism. The newspaper fears that this could lead readers to settle for a chatbot answer rather than visiting their website, ultimately impacting web traffic and, in turn, advertising and subscription revenue.
Many publishers highlighted that OpenAI is poised to become a profit-driven entity benefiting from the creative works of the media industry, resulting in a “weakened press” that does not serve the best interests of a vibrant democracy, as stated in their filing.
However, OpenAI has not commented on the new allegations. The company has consistently denied such claims, stating that its AI systems make fair use of publicly available data.
[cryptotimes]