The New York Times sues Microsoft and OpenAI for using its articles to train AI

The New York Times filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Microsoft and OpenAI, the developer of AI chatbot ChatGPT, for violations of the intellectual property rights of the articles published on its website.

The media outlet assured that the AI text generators used by both companies used content published by the media outlet to generate content. The New York Times' articles were used to train their artificial intelligence systems.

According to the newspaper, the defendants used its content without permission. The use of the articles served to "create substitute products without unpaid permission," according to the complaint filed this Wednesday in the Federal Court for the Southern District of New York. The plaintiff did not specify the amount of losses linked to the operations of Microsoft and ChatGPT, but asks the courts to order the deletion of all data containing protected material that has been used by the AI systems.

The New York Times tried to reach a prior agreement with the technology companies. OpenAI and Microsoft have contracts in place with Politico's parent company and the Associated Press, which allows the platforms to use copyrighted content. According to The Hill, The New York Times contacted both companies to reach a similar agreement, but the negotiations led to the complaint this Wednesday.