Que s'est-il passé
The Straits Times, citing Reuters, reported that The Seattle Times and Newsday filed a federal copyright lawsuit on Sept. 4 against OpenAI and Microsoft. The newspapers allege that the companies scraped their websites, including paywalled material, and used the articles in datasets supporting products such as ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and Bing’s AI features.
The Straits Times reported that The Seattle Times and Newsday sued OpenAI and Microsoft in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on Sept. 4. The newspapers allege that the companies copied their journalism without permission to train AI systems.
According to the report, the complaint alleges that OpenAI and Microsoft scraped both newspapers’ websites, including content behind paywalls, and incorporated the material into datasets used to train and operate ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and Bing AI features.
The newspapers also allege that the products can reproduce passages from their reporting, closely paraphrase articles and answer questions in ways that reduce users’ need to visit their websites or purchase subscriptions. The report does not independently confirm those alleged behaviors or the contents of the datasets.
The plaintiffs are seeking an order requiring the destruction of copies of their works, as well as training datasets or AI models that incorporate them. OpenAI said its models are trained on publicly available data and grounded in fair use, while Microsoft said it values local journalism and is open to discussing solutions.
Détails de la source: straitstimes.com ↗
Pourquoi c'est important
The case adds two major newspaper publishers to the growing legal challenge over whether AI companies can use copyrighted journalism to train and operate systems. It could affect how publishers protect paywalled reporting, negotiate licensing and respond when AI products summarize or reproduce news without sending readers to the original source.
The lawsuit directly tests a central dispute in : whether copying news articles into training systems and generating responses based on that material is protected by fair use or requires permission and compensation. The outcome could influence publishers beyond these two newspapers.
For news organizations, the alleged ability of AI products to reproduce or closely paraphrase reporting raises both copyright and business concerns. If users receive useful answers without visiting the original publication, publishers may face pressure on subscriptions, advertising and referral traffic.
The case also broadens the litigation landscape beyond the New York Times’ previously reported lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft. However, this is described as a separate case, and its legal merits and likely outcome are not established by the filing or by the report alone.
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Que regarder ensuite
The case is at the allegation stage. Key unknowns include what evidence the newspapers will present about scraping, training-data use and product outputs, whether the court accepts the fair-use arguments, and whether the parties pursue licensing or another settlement.
Watch for OpenAI and Microsoft’s formal court filings, including their responses to the scraping, paywall, training-data and output allegations. The companies’ initial public comments do not resolve those factual disputes.
The complaint’s requested destruction of works, datasets and models could create difficult questions about how courts would identify and remediate copyrighted material embedded in complex AI systems.
The report does not document damages, a settlement, a licensing proposal, a ruling on fair use or any confirmed change to ChatGPT, Copilot or Bing. It also does not independently verify that the newspapers’ content is present in particular datasets or models.