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Perplexity has dismissed the lawsuits as a common, yet historically unsuccessful, tactic used by publishers against new technologies
Perplexity maintains that it does not scrape data to build its core foundation models but rather indexes webpages and provides factual citations, emphasising its role as an intelligent research assistant. Representational image
The New York Times has intensified its legal campaign against the burgeoning generative AI industry, filing a lawsuit against the artificial intelligence startup Perplexity, accusing the “answer engine” of illegally copying and repurposing millions of its articles, videos, and podcasts. The lawsuit, filed in federal court, claims that Perplexity’s business model fundamentally relies on scraping The Times’ paywalled and copyrighted material to produce responses that are often verbatim or substantially similar copies of the publication’s proprietary work, directly substituting for the newspaper’s own offerings.
The Times asserts that this practice constitutes an unfair use of copyrighted material because Perplexity provides commercial products that directly compete with the journalism the newspaper invests heavily in, thereby depriving The Times of revenue and control. The publication claims it contacted Perplexity multiple times over the past 18 months, issuing cease-and-desist demands to negotiate a licensing agreement, but the AI company persisted in using the content without permission or compensation.
Beyond copyright infringement, The Times also accuses Perplexity of violating its trademarks under the Lanham Act. This allegation is tied to Perplexity’s tendency to produce fabricated information, known as “hallucinations”, which are then falsely attributed to The New York Times and displayed alongside the newspaper’s registered trademarks, thereby damaging its brand credibility.
Perplexity, which recently attracted major investors and reached a valuation of around $20 billion, is vigorously defending itself. The startup’s head of communications has dismissed the lawsuits as a common, yet historically unsuccessful, tactic used by publishers against new technologies, referencing past legal battles involving radio and television. Perplexity maintains that it does not scrape data to build its core foundation models but rather indexes webpages and provides factual citations, emphasising its role as an intelligent research assistant.
This lawsuit is the latest salvo in a bitter, ongoing conflict between content creators and generative AI developers over the unauthorised use of proprietary material. The Times is already engaged in a high-profile dispute with OpenAI and Microsoft, and Perplexity itself faces similar copyright infringement lawsuits from several other major publishers, including Dow Jones, the New York Post, and the Chicago Tribune. The outcome of these cases will be pivotal in defining the future legal framework for the generative AI industry and the compensation structure for digital content creators globally.
Click here to add News18 as your preferred news source on Google. December 06, 2025, 06:23 IST
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