OpenAI has accidentally deleted potential evidence in its lawsuit against media company The New York Times. According to the media company’s counsel, the engineers at OpenAI were responsible for the mistake, deleting potential evidence in its copyright infringement lawsuit. The letter, sent to the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on November 20, also discussed its inspection of the data on the two virtual machines made available by OpenAI.
The media company’s counsel revealed that its client and fellow plaintiff, Daily News, had spent about 150 hours since November 1, reviewing OpenAI’s training data for its chatbots. The legal counsel noted that all the detailed findings had been stored carefully on both machines. Unfortunately, OpenAI engineers erased the findings and other data from one of the machines. The media company also noted that OpenAI already broke the news on November 15 during a meeting.
The attorney also revealed that OpenAI tried to recover most of the data lost during the erasure. However, the company could not restore the original folders, and file structure as were previously saved. The attorney mentioned that OpenAI was alerted of their intention to file the letter, but the company refused to sign off on filing it together.
OpenAI states its demands to the New York Times
According to a report by Bloomberg, OpenAI and Microsoft urged the NY Times to show proof that AI was ruining the news business. The news company had earlier complained about AI’s influence on several aspects of its business including advertising, licensing revenue, and subscriptions.
Both firms sent letters to the US District Court for the Southern District of New York to challenge the motion. The companies asked the media company to test the theory, instead of claiming the AI caused it to suffer revenue loss. The letters were submitted after the NY Times filed its status report, during the ongoing dispute involving all the parties involved. The New York Times previously submitted a copyright infringement lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft in December 2023.
Other news agencies respond with their copyright infringement lawsuits
Aside from both plaintiffs, OpenAI is now fighting copyright infringement lawsuits on many fronts. Its latest is the lawsuit filed by Indian news agency ANI. The news agency claimed that ChatGPT has been feeding its AI chatbot some of its content during its training. The letter also detailed the news agency’s claims that ChatGPT had been fabricating news stories and attributing them to ANI.
BREAKING: Indian news agency ANI sues OpenAI over copyright infringement in New Delhi. As AI copyright lawsuits PILE UP, this case hints at OpenAI's legal strategy and what might come next. Read this: The arguments:➤ The 1st hearing in this case took place in the New… pic.twitter.com/bKsuhCIa4P
— Luiza Jarovsky (@LuizaJarovsky) November 20, 2024
However, OpenAI has rubbished the claims of using news publishers’ content to train its chatbot. The platform’s filing included emails sent within the company noting that ANI had been added to an internal ban list. With this, the firm can’t train its chatbot with content from the website in the future.
In a Reuters report, the court had ordered OpenAI to provide a detailed explanation of ANI’s accusations in a hearing on Tuesday. OpenAI has also said it uses information available to the general public to train its chatbot, as this would ensure fair utilization of information. The company has also refuted the claims of copyright infringement leveled against it by news agencies, including Daily News, Chicago Tribune, and NY Times.
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