Canadian media sue OpenAI for using their content

(Ottawa) A coalition of Canadian media is suing OpenAI for using news content to train its ChatGPT generative artificial intelligence system.

The media involved, The Canadian Press, Torstar, Globe and MailPostmedia and CBC/-, filed a complaint Friday morning in the Superior Court of Ontario.

The coalition claims in a joint statement that OpenAI routinely violates copyright by scraping large amounts of content from Canadian media.

The statement states that OpenAI profits from this content without permission or compensation from the content owners.

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) can create text, images, video and computer code with a simple command, but systems must first study vast amounts of existing content.

This is the first case of its kind in Canada, although numerous lawsuits are pending in the United States, including a case brought by the New York Times against OpenAI and Microsoft.