Wall Street Journal, New York Post sue AI startup

Media conglomerate News Corp, which owns The Wall Street Journal, New York Post and a number of other media properties, is suing artificial intelligence (AI) startup Perplexity over what it alleges is copyright infringement.

The company’s suit, filed in New York’s Southern District this week, alleges Perplexity is illegally using the company’s copyrighted news content to feed search queries for its AI software.

“This suit is brought by news publishers who seek redress for Perplexity’s brazen scheme to compete for readers while simultaneously freeriding on the valuable content the publishers produce,” the company said in the complaint, according to the Journal.

Perplexity AI has raised tens of millions of dollars with the goal of competing with Google in the search business.

Over the summer, the company faced backlash after it published a summarized news story with information and similar wording to a Forbes investigative story but without citing the media outlet or asking for its permission, The Associated Press reported.

News Corp earlier this year struck a deal with OpenAI to license its content for use in ChatGPT, another leading chatbot.

Perplexity did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment on News Corp’s suit.