OpenAI and Microsoft are being sued again by the Seattle Times and Newsday. The news organizations say the companies used their websites to train AI systems without getting permission.
The lawsuit, filed in the Southern District of New York, claims the companies took paywalled content and used it to train ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, and the new AI-powered Bing.
According to the publishers, the chatbots could repeat whole sections or closely reword reporters’ articles. The lawsuit asks the companies to delete any copies of the material, along with any training data or AI models that include it, Reuters reported.
“We feel strongly that we must defend our content, which we spend millions of dollars a year to produce, from being used without our consent or compensation,” wrote Seattle Times president and CEO Alan Fisco in a message to employees.
OpenAI told the press that it only uses publicly available materials based on fair use for training its models. Microsoft said it was surprised by the lawsuit but is open to meeting with the publishers to find solutions.
OpenAI and Microsoft have been involved in several lawsuits over their training data and copyright infringement claims. This includes an ongoing case with the New York Times and other publishers. The Times says the companies’ products compete with the news outlet by copying its work without making enough changes to meet fair use rules.
Last week, the Trump administration filed a Statement of Interest in the case. The Department of Justice wrote that if the New York Times wins, it could hurt local newsrooms and independent journalism. The DOJ also said that AI can help small publishers compete with larger news outlets.
The brief also says that if the Times wins, it could “threaten national security” by slowing down AI progress and helping foreign competitors. The administration has used this argument before to try to stop lawsuits against AI data centers.
