NYT and US newspapers accuse OpenAI of hiding evidence in copyright dispute

The New York Times and several other US newspapers have asked a federal judge to impose sanctions on OpenAI, accusing the company of withholding key evidence in a landmark copyright lawsuit over artificial intelligence.

According to a court filing in Manhattan, the media organisations allege OpenAI failed to provide datasets and ChatGPT records that could help determine whether its AI models were trained using copyrighted news content without permission.

The publishers argue the company's actions amount to "discovery misconduct" that could affect the outcome of the case.

Steven Lieberman, an attorney representing the New York Daily News and several other newspapers, said OpenAI had been "making misrepresentations" for two years about its ability to search copyrighted material within its AI training data.

"This motion asks the court to punish OpenAI for hiding and destroying evidence showing how ChatGPT was trained on stolen journalism," Lieberman said.

OpenAI rejected the allegations as its company spokesperson Drew Pusateri told Reuters: "As the Times' case weakens and they've been forced to drop claims against us, they're persisting with their efforts to invade the privacy of people who have nothing to do with this case, including by making these blatantly false allegations."

The lawsuit, first filed by The New York Times in 2023, is one of several high-profile legal challenges over whether AI companies unlawfully used copyrighted books, news articles, music and artwork to train generative AI systems.