Microsoft and its generative AI partner OpenAI are facing more lawsuits about the use of ChatGPT and Copilot. The Verge reports that the Raw Story, The Intercept, and AlterNet news sites have filed separate legal actions against those two companies, but they all used the same law firm.
The news companies all claim that OpenAI's ChatGPT, which is also used by Microsoft's own chatbot Copilot, copies stories from their sites as part of their AI training. The news organizations also claim that when they reproduce their stories, they do not show their "author, title, copyright or terms of use information contained in those works."
Alternet and Raw Story claim that ChatGPT would not be as popular if people were made aware that the chatbot violated the copyrights of their stories. They also point out that website owners can ask OpenAI not to access their sites to train them with ChatGPT and contend that this means OpenAI and Microsoft both knew ChatGPT could violate the copyrights of those works.
Back in December 2023, The New York Times filed a similar lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft. The newspaper and website organization also claimed that ChatGPT illegally accessed "millions of articles published by The Times."'
However, this week OpenAI filed a counterclaim, alleging that The New York Times actually hired someone to hack into OpenAI's services. The unidentified hacker then exploited a bug, by using deceptive text prompts, in the chatbot which resulted in the responses that the news organization showed in its original lawsuit.
It looks like the stage is set for some big legal battles in court between Microsoft and OpenAI against the news organizations who feel their content is being illegally accessed. The final results of these court proceedings could determine if these news sites have the right to keep their stories away from generative AI services.
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