NYT-led group asks court to sanction OpenAI in US copyright dispute

The New York Times, the Daily News, and other US media outlets have asked a federal judge to impose sanctions on OpenAI, escalating a legal battle over artificial intelligence (AI) and copyright that could shape the struggling news industry. The newspapers accuse the ChatGPT maker of hiding evidence crucial to a potential landmark copyright infringement trial.

At issue is how OpenAI and its partner Microsoft built their AI technologies using millions of news articles. The plaintiffs argue that AI chatbots unfairly compete as information sources, diverting web traffic without doing the journalistic work. A filing on Thursday in Manhattan federal court alleges OpenAI “chose obstruction” over releasing data sets and ChatGPT logs that could show how the AI system used copyrighted content.

The plaintiffs request penalties for “discovery misconduct,” claiming a recent deposition of an OpenAI employee contradicts the company’s earlier statements. New York Daily News attorney Steven Lieberman said OpenAI has been “making misrepresentations” for two years about its ability to search for copyrighted material in training data. “This motion asks the court to punish OpenAI for hiding and destroying evidence showing how ChatGPT was trained on stolen journalism,” Lieberman said.

OpenAI has previously argued that turning over ChatGPT logs would violate user privacy. In response to the filing, OpenAI spokesperson Drew Pusateri said the newspaper’s claims are “blatantly false” and that they are trying to invade the privacy of unrelated people, according to Reuters.

The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in late 2023, about a year after ChatGPT’s launch. Other news companies later joined the case. This is one of many lawsuits by copyright owners against AI firms. The Times has spent over $28 million on litigation, while many media organizations have signed licensing deals with OpenAI and other AI companies.