OpenAI is asking a New York federal judge to reject a sanctions request that could make its ongoing copyright battle with major news organizations even more complicated. At the center of the dispute is a 20 million chat sample and whether OpenAI properly handled the records it was supposed to preserve.
The New York Times and other news organizations accuse OpenAI and Microsoft of using their copyrighted work to train AI models and generate responses without permission. Last month, the publishers asked the court to sanction OpenAI, claiming the company failed to preserve certain ChatGPT conversations and did not provide accurate information about its ability to search for copyrighted material.
OpenAI disagrees. The company says the chats in question were deleted because users requested their removal under data retention policies that were already in place before the lawsuit began. OpenAI also says it preserved more than 50 billion chat logs and complied with the court’s preservation requirements.
A major part of the dispute involves a court approved sample of 20 million ChatGPT conversations. The publishers say the sample could help determine whether ChatGPT reproduced their copyrighted material.
They want the court to prevent OpenAI from using the sample, award them legal fees and costs, and potentially allow a jury to assume that ChatGPT reproduced copyrighted works. OpenAI argues that the publishers are taking disagreements over discovery and turning them into accusations of intentional evidence destruction.
Microsoft is not accused of misconduct in the sanctions dispute, but the company is still asking the judge to reject the proposed penalties. Microsoft argues that sanctions against OpenAI could hurt its own defense because some of the copyright claims against Microsoft depend on allegations involving OpenAI.
The company also says it could be difficult for a jury to separate any findings against OpenAI from the claims involving Microsoft.
The judge has not yet ruled on the sanctions request. For now, the dispute remains focused on evidence and whether OpenAI followed the court’s rules for preserving and producing records.
The larger copyright case is still moving forward, with the news organizations continuing to argue that their copyrighted work was used without permission. The sanctions decision could affect how that evidence is presented, making this a closely watched step in a much bigger fight over copyright and artificial intelligence.
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