Toronto, Canada – A coalition of major news outlets in Canada has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, the creator of the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT. The lawsuit alleges that OpenAI is unlawfully using news articles to train its software, marking the first of its kind in the country. Included in the group of news organizations participating in the suit are Toronto Star, Metroland Media, Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, and CBC.
According to the media organizations, journalism is essential for the public interest, and using other companies’ journalism for commercial gain is illegal. OpenAI claims that its models are trained on publicly available data and are consistent with fair use and international copyright principles. Despite this, the Canadian media coalition states that OpenAI has been scraping content from Canadian media without regard for copyright protections or paywalls meant to prevent unauthorized copying.
The group of publishers is seeking punitive damages of C$20,000 per article that was allegedly used unlawfully to train ChatGPT, potentially amounting to billions of dollars in compensation. Additionally, they are requesting that OpenAI share profits made from using their articles and an injunction to prevent the company from using their content in the future.
This legal action against OpenAI in Canada follows a similar lawsuit filed in the United States by the New York Times and other publishers. In that case, the Times accused OpenAI of destroying evidence necessary for trial. Additionally, the Authors Guild and a group of prominent writers, including John Grisham, have also claimed copyright infringement by the company.
OpenAI, recently valued at C$219 billion after a fundraising round, is facing increasing scrutiny from media organizations worldwide for its practices regarding the use of news articles to train its AI models. The outcome of these legal battles could have significant implications for the intersection of artificial intelligence technology and copyrighted content in the digital age.