Chicago Tribune sues Perplexity (techcrunch.com)

The Chicago Tribune has filed a federal lawsuit against the AI search engine Perplexity, alleging copyright infringement. The lawsuit claims that Perplexity is providing content from the Tribune verbatim, despite the company’s assertion that it only generates non-verbatim factual summaries. Central to the case is Perplexity’s use of Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), a methodological approach designed to enhance accuracy by sourcing verified data. The Tribune contends that Perplexity’s RAG system leverages its articles, allegedly scraped without authorization, and that the Comet browser they operate bypasses the publication’s paywall, allowing users to access detailed summaries of Tribune content for free. This lawsuit is significant for the AI/ML community as it raises critical questions about the legal implications of using published material for training models and the responsibilities of AI systems that utilize factual data sources. With the proliferation of similar lawsuits, including ongoing actions from major news publications against OpenAI and Microsoft, this case could set important precedents regarding the intersection of intellectual property rights and emerging AI technologies. The outcome may influence how AI developers approach content sourcing and model training in the future.