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Lawsuit claims Perplexity AI engages in illegal copying of

copyrighted work

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Perplexity's AI allegedly substitutes original news

sources,

harming publishers

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News Corp ( NWSA )-owned publishers among those suing AI firms for

copyright infringement

By Dawn Chmielewski, Katie Paul

Oct 21 (Reuters) - Media baron Rupert Murdoch's Dow

Jones and New York Post filed a lawsuit against Perplexity AI on

Monday, claiming the AI startup engages in a "massive amount of

illegal copying" of their copyrighted work.

The lawsuit is the latest salvo in a bitter ongoing battle

between publishers and tech companies over how the latter may

use copyrighted content without authorization to build and

operate their AI systems.

Perplexity's search tools enable users to get instant

answers to questions with sources and citations. It is powered

by a variety of large language models (LLMs) that can sum up and

generate information, from OpenAI to Meta's open-source model

Llama.

"This suit is brought by news publishers who seek redress for

Perplexity's brazen scheme to compete for readers while

simultaneously freeriding on the valuable content the publishers

produce," read the lawsuit filed in the Southern District Of New

York. Wall Street Journal parent Dow Jones and NY Post are owned

by Murdoch's News Corp. ( NWSA )

Perplexity did not immediately respond to an email from Reuters

seeking comment.

In the suit, the news publishers say their journalists

investigate and write stories under tight deadlines and

unpredictable circumstances. There is high demand for

high-quality news presented in a timely, digestible format, they

argue. These publications rely on the sale of advertising and

subscriptions to underwrite the cost of journalism.

The news organizations allege Perplexity's AI-generated

"answer machine" has ingested its copyrighted news stories,

analysis and opinion in an internal database used to generate

responses to users' queries. Its responses act as a substitute

for other news and information sources - touting the fact that

its answers are so reliable users can "skip the links."

In the quest to provide answers, Dow Jones and the New York

Post allege Perplexity copied "vast" quantities of its work into

a database, which uses an AI technique known as

retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) to provide answers to

users' queries.

Perplexity formulates its responses in a way that at times

reproduce the content, verbatim, the news organizations claim.

The suit alleges these actions constitute an unlawful copyright

infringement.

"Perplexity perpetrates an abuse of intellectual property

that harms journalists, writers, publishers and News Corp ( NWSA )," News

Corp ( NWSA ) CEO Robert Thomson said in a statement.

"The perplexing Perplexity has willfully copied copious

amounts of copyrighted material without compensation, and

shamelessly presents repurposed material as a direct substitute

for the original source. Perplexity proudly states that users

can 'skip the links' - apparently, Perplexity wants to skip the

check," he said.

Dow Jones and the New York Post are asking the court to

stop Perplexity from using its news articles as the basis for

providing answers to questions, and to order the destruction of

any database using its copyrighted work.

With its lawsuit, News Corp ( NWSA ) is joining the ranks of

multiple publishers that have

sued AI companies for copyright infringement

over their use of content without authorization, both to

train algorithms and to generate summaries of real-time

information.

Earlier this month, New York Times sent Perplexity a "cease and

desist" notice demanding it to stop using the newspaper's

content for generative AI purposes.

Perplexity has also faced accusations from media

organizations such as Forbes and Wired for plagiarizing their

content, but has since launched a revenue-sharing program to

address some concerns put forward by publishers.

Some publishers are

signing licensing agreements

with AI companies open to paying for content, although the

sides often disagree over the value of the materials. Many AI

developers argue they have broken no laws in accessing them for

free.

In May, News Corp ( NWSA ) announced it had struck a

multi-year partnership with OpenAI

, with Thomson applauding the tech company for understanding

"that integrity and creativity are essential" to realize the

potential of artificial intelligence.

While Perplexity has drawn the most scrutiny for its RAG

practices, it is not alone among AI companies in circumventing a

common web standard used by publishers to block the scraping of

their content, content licensing startup TollBit

told publishers

over the summer.