OpenAI is being sued for copyright infringement yet again. This time by the Asian News International (ANI) in India in a New Delhi court. As the Hindu Business Online reports, “The news agency is seeking initial damages of ₹20 million ($236,910), its lawyer Sidhant Kumar said.”
From the report, ANI asserts infringement by OpenAI’s alleged use of ANI content to train its model as well as alleged storage of the data. India copyright law does not contain a fair use provision. Instead, it has the more limited “fair dealing” provision:
52. Certain acts not to be infringement of copyright.— (1) The following acts shall not constitute an infringement of copyright, namely,—
(a) a fair dealing with any work, not being a computer programme, for the purposes of—
(i) private or personal use, including research;
(ii) criticism or review, whether of that work or of any other work;
(iii) the reporting of current events and current affairs, including the reporting of a lecture delivered in public.
According to some lawyers in India, the application of fair dealing is narrow: whether it can apply to text and data mining is unclear.
According to AI Fray, OpenAI reportedly said during the court proceeding that it blocked the website of ANI (apparently so its content is not collected from the Internet for use in training).
This lawsuit adds to to OpenAI’s copyright lawsuits. GEMA sued OpenAI recently in Germany.
OpenAI faces 13 copyright lawsuits in the United States, some of which have been consolidated. Plus, Elon Musk has filed a lawsuit against Sam Altman and OpenAI for their decision to allegedly abandon OpenAI’s nonprofit purpose.