The Seattle Times and Newsday filed a lawsuit in September 2026 against OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging the companies used their journalism without authorization to train artificial intelligence systems.
The lawsuit warns that generative AI could leave the journalism industry “broken beyond repair,” describing the technology as “a snake eating its own tail” that could “destroy the very organizations” that produce the content it relies on. The filing argues that AI products like ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Copilot are “rapacious consumers, devouring human-authored content and delivering back to the world copies and derivative imitations of that same original content they consumed to achieve their commercial objectives.”
The case joins a growing wave of copyright litigation against the two companies. The New York Times launched the first major action in 2023, alleging copyright infringement, and other publications have followed since. The Seattle Times’ involvement carries a notable wrinkle: Microsoft and OpenAI have previously funded journalism projects and fellowships at the organization.
A Microsoft spokesperson told GeekWire the company is “surprised by the lawsuit” but is “always happy to sit down and explore solutions to this type of dispute.”
The suits collectively raise questions about the long-term relationship between AI developers and the news organizations whose reporting may have been used to build those systems — and whether that practice could undermine the financial viability of the outlets producing that content.
Source: TechCrunch