Several major Canadian news outlets, including Torstar, Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, and CBC/Radio-Canada, have filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the company of scraping their content without permission or compensation to develop its products. The lawsuit is part of a larger trend where copyright holders, such as authors, artists, and music publishers, are taking legal action against OpenAI and similar tech companies.
The news organizations argue that OpenAI’s use of their content for commercial purposes is illegal, as journalism is considered to be in the public interest. The Canadian companies have submitted an 84-page claim to Ontario’s Superior Court, seeking damages and a permanent injunction to prevent OpenAI from using their material without consent.
OpenAI has responded by asserting that its models were trained on publicly available data, which it considers to be in line with fair use and international copyright laws. The company emphasized that it works closely with news publishers, offering them options to opt-out and proper attribution for their content. Interestingly, the legal filing does not mention Microsoft, a key investor in OpenAI.
In a similar case in the U.S., a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit in November 2024 where Raw Story and AlterNet accused OpenAI of misusing their articles.
NEWS DESK
PRESS UPDATE