The US government’s backing of OpenAI in the NYT copyright case removes a major legal obstacle for AI training data access, boosting confidence in AI investment
Executive summary: The United States government filed a legal brief supporting OpenAI in the New York Times lawsuit alleging that the company used the newspaper's articles to train its AI models without compensation, asserting that such use causes no commercial harm and does not violate copyright. The stance reduces legal risk for AI firms relying on copyrighted text for training, potentially lowering barriers to AI development and affecting content creators’ ability to monetize their work.
Who is involved: United States Department of Justice, OpenAI, New York Times.
Likely next: The case will proceed to further briefing and a judicial decision on the New York Times’ motion for summary judgment, with a ruling expected in the coming months.
The United States Department of Justice filed a brief supporting OpenAI, arguing that using New York Times articles to train AI models causes no commercial harm and does not violate copyright. This stance directly counters the newspaper’s claim that OpenAI’s training practices infringe its intellectual property and should be compensated. While the move lowers immediate litigation risk for AI firms that rely on large text corpora, it also intensifies the debate over how copyright law applies to generative AI and what compensation, if any, content creators deserve.
Timeline
- — KI: US-Regierung stellt sich in Urheberrechtsstreit hinter OpenAI (Handelsblatt)
Analysis — what this means
Sectors affected
- AI training data providers
- Generative AI model developers
- News publishing industry
Regulatory implications
- US DOJ brief argues that training AI on copyrighted text causes no commercial harm and does not violate copyright, indicating a lenient enforcement stance on AI data use.
Historical parallels
- Google Books case (Authors Guild v. Google, 2015) where courts held mass scanning for search was fair use
- Oracle v. Google API copyright case (Supreme Court 2021) ruling that API reimplementation is fair use
Key entities
Sources
Open the full interactive case file on Beyond →