Major Publishers Sue Google Again Over AI Training

A coalition of prominent publishers and authors has initiated a class action lawsuit against Google, asserting that the technology giant unlawfully utilized their copyrighted materials to train its artificial intelligence platform, Gemini.

The plaintiffs in this action, including major entities like Hachette, Cengage, Elsevier, along with author Scott Turow and S.C.R.I.B.E., further contend that Google deliberately altered or removed copyright information from these works. This alleged action was intended to "conceal… that its Gemini Models were trained on stolen materials," according to the lawsuit's filing.

This legal challenge is part of a growing wave of complaints filed by publishers, authors, and other copyright holders against leading AI companies, such as Meta, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google itself.

While numerous such cases remain unresolved, two initial court decisions in California have leaned in favor of the AI companies. These rulings have designated the use of copyrighted works for AI training as "fair use" under existing U.S. copyright law, a legal framework that predates the internet and has not seen significant updates since.

In a notable counterpoint, Anthropic faced a substantial penalty of $1.5 billion for pirating training materials, marking the largest payout in the history of U.S. copyright law. This settlement made approximately half a million writers eligible for payments of at least $3,000. However, a significant number of authors chose to decline their portion of the settlement, opting instead to pursue further legal action concerning AI training practices.

The California judges' pronouncements may suggest a potential inclination for other courts when evaluating the tech companies' "fair use" defense. However, the intricate nature of these disputes means these rulings are unlikely to establish an incontrovertible precedent. The lawsuit against Google has been filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, providing an opportunity for a different judicial perspective to emerge.

A distinctive aspect of the Google case lies in the nuanced, long-standing relationship between the publishers and the company. The lawsuit elaborates on the historical arrangement where publishers and authors have provided Google with copyrighted works specifically for inclusion in Google Books, enabling searchability. These search results typically offer only brief snippets and bibliographic data, not full access to the books. The plaintiffs allege that Google proceeded to train Gemini using copies of these very books, as well as those uploaded to the Google Play store, despite never having received authorization for such use.

"Google illegally copied works from all these scope-limited programs for AI training, knowing it lacked authorization to do so," the lawsuit explicitly states.

Furthermore, the plaintiffs reference an internal Google document that purportedly acknowledged the potential for using copyrighted books in AI training to be "highly problematic for Google" and possibly lead to "$10Bs-$100Bs in potential fines."

Google has not yet provided an immediate response to requests for comment on the matter.