Eight US newspapers sue OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement

A group of eight US newspapers is suing ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging that the technology companies have been “purloining millions” of copyrighted news articles without permission or payment to train their artificial intelligence chatbots.

The New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, Denver Post and other papers filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in a New York federal court.

“We’ve spent billions of dollars gathering information and reporting news at our publications, and we can’t allow OpenAI and Microsoft to expand the Big Tech playbook of stealing our work to build their own businesses at our expense,” said a written statement from Frank Pine, executive editor for the MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing.

The other newspapers that are part of the lawsuit are MediaNews Group’s Mercury News, Denver Post, Orange County Register and St Paul Pioneer-Press, and Tribune Publishing’s Orlando Sentinel and South Florida Sun Sentinel. All of the newspapers are owned by Alden Global Capital.

Microsoft declined to comment on Tuesday. OpenAI didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

In December, the New York Times sued both OpenAI and Microsoft on similar grounds, alleging that the creation and training of ChatGPT involved the illegal use of copyrighted material. The Times said the tech companies’ product “threatens the Times’s ability to provide that service”.