A coalition of major Canadian media outlets announced on Friday that they are suing OpenAI, the creator of the generative artificial intelligence interface ChatGPT, accusing it of misappropriating their content, marking a first in the country.
"OpenAI regularly violates copyright and online usage terms by harvesting large amounts of content from Canadian media to develop its products, such as ChatGPT," the coalition stated in a release. They argue that the California-based company "capitalizes and profits from the use of this content without seeking permission or compensating the owners."
The organizations involved - Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, CBC/Radio-Canada, and Torstar, the parent company of the Toronto Star - are seeking CAD 20,000 for each article they claim was illegally collected and used to train ChatGPT. The total value of the lawsuit amounts to several billion dollars.
