Judge Rejects Bid to to Dismiss New York Times Lawsuit Against Open AI, Microsoft

A U.S. federal judge has ruled that a New York Times copyright infringement lawsuit against Open AI and Microsoft can proceed, denying motions by both companies attempting to dismiss the case.

“After due deliberation, the Court hereby denies OpenAI’s motions to dismiss the direct infringement claims involving conduct occurring more than three years before the complaints were filed; the defendants’ motions to dismiss the contributory copyright infringement claims; and the defendants’ motions to dismiss the state and federal trademark dilution claims in the Daily News action,” the ruling by U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein reads.

The New York Times sued Open AI and Microsoft for copyright infringement in December 2023 after it found that the tech giants had stolen the content from “millions” of articles that are behind its paywall and available only to subscribers, and used that content to train their AI models. Both companies responded to this suit in incredulous ways, with OpenAI explicitly admitting to the theft but arguing that it was fair use, and Microsoft using unrelated legal precedent to similarly argue fair use.

The ruling covers several motions, one of which, Daily News v. Microsoft, we didn’t write about In April 2024, eight newspapers similar filed copyright infringement lawsuits against Microsoft and OpenAI for the same reasons as The New York Times: The companies “purloined millions of [the publications’] copyrighted articles without permission and without payment to fuel the commercialization” of Copilot and ChatGPT. And while The New York Times won on all the major points, allowing its case to proceed, the judge granted OpenAI and Microsoft a few minor motions, somewhat narrowing the case.

“We appreciate the opportunity to present a jury with the facts about how OpenAI and Microsoft are profiting wildly from stealing the original content of newspapers across the country,” a New York Times statement reads.

“We look forward to making it clear that we build our AI models using publicly available data, in a manner grounded in fair use, and supportive of innovation,” an OpenAI statement retorts. Of course, what OpenAI was really looking forward to is not defending this behavior in court. Which it will now have to do, unless it can reach a settlement. Which it should try to do.

No trial date has been set, but Judge Stein noted that “The Court will issue an Opinion setting forth the reasons for this ruling expeditiously.” One suspects this will not reflect well on Microsoft and OpenAI.