Canadian Court Allows News Publishers’ Copyright Lawsuit Against OpenAI to Proceed

The Ontario Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal by OpenAI, allowing a copyright lawsuit filed by Canadian news publishers against the artificial intelligence company to proceed in the province.

The lawsuit, launched two years ago by a coalition of Canadian media organisations, including The Canadian Press, Torstar, The Globe and Mail, Postmedia and CBC/Radio-Canada, accuses OpenAI of using their news content to train ChatGPT without permission or compensation.

The publishers argue that the practice breaches copyright laws and allows OpenAI to profit from their work without authorisation.

OpenAI challenges Canadian court's jurisdiction

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, had challenged the Ontario court's jurisdiction, arguing that the case should instead be heard in the United States.

However, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled that it had the authority to hear the lawsuit. OpenAI subsequently appealed the decision, but the Court of Appeal dismissed the challenge on Friday.

In its ruling, the appeal court noted that OpenAI had not presented evidence showing that a Canadian judgment would conflict with existing United States laws in a way that could complicate its enforcement.

The court also upheld the lower court's position that “the fair and efficient working of the Canadian legal system favoured allowing Canadian authors to bring claims against foreign companies for breaches of Canadian laws.”

First Canadian case of its kind

The lawsuit, which has been ongoing since 2024, is the first Canadian case to address the use of copyrighted material to train generative artificial intelligence systems.

Earlier this year, Postmedia, Torstar, The Globe and Mail and The Canadian Press filed a separate copyright lawsuit against another AI company, Anthropic.

News and cultural industry groups have also urged the federal government to establish a position on how AI companies use copyrighted content. However, Ottawa has not announced plans to take action or amend the Copyright Act.

Copyright disputes spread across the US

Several lawsuits involving artificial intelligence companies and copyright infringement are also underway in the United States, with some dating back to 2023.

One of the cases involves a group of publishers, including the Toronto Star, Condé Nast and McClatchy, which accuse Canadian AI company Cohere of infringing their copyright by scraping articles from the internet without permission or compensation.

The latest ruling allows the Canadian publishers' case against OpenAI to proceed in Ontario, where the court will consider the copyright claims.

The Canadian Press