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Not the sincerest form of flattery — NY Times copyright suit wants OpenAI to delete all GPT instances Shows evidence that GPT-based systems will reproduce Times articles if asked.

John Timmer – Dec 27, 2023 7:05 pm UTC Enlarge / Microsoft is named in the suit for allegedly building the system that allowed GPT derivatives to be trained using infringing material.Just_Super reader comments 359

In August, word leaked out that The New York Times was considering joining the growing legion of creators that are suing AI companies for misappropriating their content. The Times had reportedly been negotiating with OpenAI regarding the potential to license its material, but those talks had not gone smoothly. So, eight months after the company was reportedly considering suing, the suit has now been filed.

The Times is targeting various companies under the OpenAI umbrella, as well as Microsoft, an OpenAI partner that both uses it to power its Copilot service and helped provide the infrastructure for training the GPT Large Language Model. But the suit goes well beyond the use of copyrighted material in training, alleging that OpenAI-powered software will happily circumvent the Times’ paywall and ascribe hallucinated misinformation to the Times. Journalism is expensive

The suit notes that The Times maintains a large staff that allows it to do things like dedicate reporters to a huge range of beats and engage in important investigative journalism, among other things. Because of those investments, the newspaper is often considered an authoritative source on many matters.

All of that costs money, and The Times earns that by limiting access to its reporting through a robust paywall. In addition, each print edition has a copyright notification, the Times’ terms of service limit the copying and use of any published material, and it can be selective about how it licenses its stories. In addition to driving revenue, these restrictions also help it to maintain its reputation as an authoritative voice by controlling how its works appear.

The suit alleges that OpenAI-developed tools undermine all of that. “By providing Times content without The Timess permission or authorization, Defendants tools undermine and damage The Timess relationship with its readers and deprive The Times of subscription, licensing, advertising, and affiliate revenue,” the suit alleges.

Part of the unauthorized use The Times alleges came during the training of various versions of GPT. Prior to GPT-3.5, information about the training dataset was made public. One of the sources used is a large collection of online material called “Common Crawl,” which the suit alleges contains information from 16 million unique records from sites published by The Times. That places the Times as the third most referenced source, behind Wikipedia and a database of US patents. Advertisement

OpenAI no longer discloses as many details of the data used for training of recent GPT versions, but all indications are that full-text NY Times articles are still part of that process (Much more on that in a moment.) Expect access to training information to be a major issue during discovery if this case moves forward. Not just training

A number of suits have been filed regarding the use of copyrighted material during training of AI systems. But the Times’ suit goes well beyond that to show how the material ingested during training can come back out during use. “Defendants GenAI tools can generate output that recites Times content verbatim, closely summarizes it, and mimics its expressive style, as demonstrated by scores of examples,” the suit alleges.

The suit allegesand we were able to verifythat it’s comically easy to get GPT-powered systems to offer up content that is normally protected by the Times’ paywall. The suit shows a number of examples of GPT-4 reproducing large sections of articles nearly verbatim.

The suit includes screenshots of ChatGPT being given the title of a piece at The New York Times and asked for the first paragraph, which it delivers. Getting the ensuing text is apparently as simple as repeatedly asking for the next paragraph.

ChatGPT has apparently closed that loophole in between the preparation of that suit and the present. We entered some of the prompts shown in the suit, and were advised “I recommend checking The New York Times website or other reputable sources,” although we can’t rule out that context provided prior to that prompt could produce copyrighted material. Ask for a paragraph, and Copilot will hand you a wall of normally paywalled text.John Timmer

But not all loopholes have been closed. The suit also shows output from Bing Chat, since rebranded as Copilot. We were able to verify that asking for the first paragraph of a specific article at The Times caused Copilot to reproduce the first third of the article. Advertisement

The suit is dismissive of attempts to justify this as a form of fair use. “Publicly, Defendants insist that their conduct is protected as ‘fair use’ because their unlicensed use of copyrighted content to train GenAI models serves a new ‘transformative’ purpose,” the suit notes. “But there is nothing ‘transformative’ about using The Timess content without payment to create products that substitute for The Times and steal audiences away from it.” Reputational and other damages

The hallucinations common to AI also came under fire in the suit for potentially damaging the value of the Times’ reputation, and possibly damaging human health as a side effect. “A GPT model completely fabricated that The New York Times published an article on January 10, 2020, titled Study Finds Possible Link between Orange Juice and Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, the suit alleges. “The Times never published such an article.”

Similarly, asking about a Times article on heart-healthy foods allegedly resulted in Copilot saying it contained a list of examples (which it didn’t). When asked for the list, 80 percent of the foods on weren’t even mentioned by the original article. In another case, recommendations were ascribed to the Wirecutter when the products hadn’t even been reviewed by its staff.

As with the Times material, it’s alleged that it’s possible to get Copilot to offer up large chunks of Wirecutter articles (The Wirecutter is owned by The New York Times). But the suit notes that these article excerpts have the affiliate links stripped out of them, keeping the Wirecutter from its primary source of revenue.

The suit targets various OpenAI companies for developing the software, as well as Microsoftthe latter for both offering OpenAI-powered services, and for having developed the computing systems that enabled the copyrighted material to be ingested during training. Allegations include direct, contributory, and vicarious copyright infringement, as well as DMCA and trademark violations. Finally, it alleges “Common Law Unfair Competition By Misappropriation.”

The suit seeks nothing less than the erasure of both any GPT instances that the parties have trained using material from the Times, as well as the destruction of the datasets that were used for the training. It also asks for a permanent injunction to prevent similar conduct in the future. The Times also wants money, lots and lots of money: “statutory damages, compensatory damages, restitution, disgorgement, and any other relief that may be permitted by law or equity.” reader comments 359 John Timmer John is Ars Technica’s science editor. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Biochemistry rom Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley. When physically separated from his keyboard, he tends to seek out a bicycle, or a scenic location for communing with his hiking boots. Advertisement Channel Ars Technica ← Previous story Next story → Related Stories Today on Ars

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Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ‘kidnapped aide at gunpoint’ to confront rival rapper Kid Cudi, court hears

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Sean 'Diddy' Combs 'kidnapped aide at gunpoint' to confront rival rapper Kid Cudi, court hears

Sean “Diddy” Combs kidnapped a former aide at gunpoint to join him as he attempted to confront love rival rapper Kid Cudi, his sex-trafficking trial has been told.

Capricorn Clark, who worked for the Bad Boy Records co-founder in different roles on and off for several years, told the court he banged on her door and told her: “Get dressed, we’re going to kill Mescudi.”

Kid Cudi, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, last week testified himself about the alleged incident in December 2011.

Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence – which marked the start of the third week of the high-profile trial. She told the court her situation working for the hip-hop mogul was “complicated”.

Combs, 55, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution, is accused of subjecting his former long-term partner Cassie and others to years of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs trial: Day 10 – as it happened

Sean 'Diddy' Combs watches as his former assistant Capricorn Clark is questioned by prosecutor Mitzi Steiner at his sex trafficking trial in New York on 27 May 2025. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters
Image:
Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters

While giving her own evidence in the first week of the trial, Cassie told jurors she dated Cudi briefly during a difficult period in her on-off relationship with Combs.

On Tuesday, Ms Clark said she warned Cassie about seeing Cudi, saying she took her to buy a burner phone as she thought it could be dangerous given how Combs might react. “The way she was moving, she was going to get us all killed,” Ms Clark said.

Combs arrived at her home with a gun in his hand on the morning of the attempted confrontation with Cudi, she told the court, and looked “furious”.

She says she told him she did not want to go with him, to which he allegedly replied: “I don’t give a f**k what you want to do.”

Rapper Kid Cudi leaves Federal Court after testifying at the trial of Sean "Diddy" Combs in New York, Thursday, May 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Image:
Rapper Kid Cudi gave evidence last week. Pic: AP/ Richard Drew

Ms Clark said she had never seen “anything like this before”, but got dressed and left with Combs in a black Cadillac to head to the property in the Hollywood Hills.

She said she waited in the car as Combs went into the residence, and called Cassie to warn her. The rapper had her “with a gun and brought me to Cudi’s house to kill him”, she said she told her.

Cudi could be heard in the background of the call, she said, asking: “He’s in my house?”

After the incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs warned her and Cassie not to speak to police and threatened to “kill all you” if they did not convince Cudi not to either.

In the aftermath of this incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs “came at” Cassie with “100% full force”, repeatedly kicking her while she crouched “more and more” into a foetal position and cried “silently”.

The rapper told Ms Clark that if she tried to intervene, “he was going to f**k me up too”, she said.

Janice Combs, mother of Sean "Diddy" Combs, arrives at court.
Pic: Reuters
Image:
Diddy’s mother Janice Combs was in court to support him again. Pic: Reuters

Earlier in her testimony, she told the court about the start of her employment with Combs and his label Bad Boy Records in 2004.

She said after he discovered she had previously worked for Marion “Suge” Knight’s Death Row Records – the West Coast rival to East Coast Bad Boy – he told her “if anything happened, he would have to kill me”.

Ms Clark said she perceived this as a “very serious” threat. She also told the court about another alleged incident just a few weeks into the job, when some diamond jewellery on loan to Combs went missing.

She told the court she was taken to a building in Manhattan and forced to repeatedly take lie detector tests over five days.

Sean "Diddy" Combs speaks with his legal team before court begins for the day at Combs' sex trafficking trial in New York City, New York, U.S., May 27, 2025 in this courtroom sketch. REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg
Image:
Combs with his legal team before court began for the day. Pic: Reuters/ Jane Rosenberg


The man who carried out the test told her that if she failed, “they’re going to throw you in the East River”, she said.

Combs was not present for the tests and never spoke to her about them, she said, when questioned by defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo.

During her testimony, Ms Clark mentioned an incident involving fellow rapper 50 Cent’s manager, after both 50 Cent and Combs had done interviews for MTV.

Combs mentioned to the manager that they had some issues and told him, “I like guns”, she said, which she perceived as a vague threat.

Read more:
Everything you need to know about the Sean Combs trial
The rise and fall of Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs

Ms Clark also described attempting to leave Combs’s home in Miami on one occasion in 2006, when she was allegedly told to “get the f**k back here” by the rapper.

According to Ms Clark, he told her: “Your problem is you want a life, and you can’t have that here.”

The trial continues tomorrow, with evidence expected from LA police and fire officers.

If convicted, Combs could face between 15 years and life in prison.

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Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ‘kidnapped aide at gunpoint’ to confront rival rapper Kid Cudi, court hears

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Sean 'Diddy' Combs 'kidnapped aide at gunpoint' to confront rival rapper Kid Cudi, court hears

Sean “Diddy” Combs kidnapped a former aide at gunpoint to join him as he attempted to confront love rival rapper Kid Cudi, his sex-trafficking trial has been told.

Capricorn Clark, who worked for the Bad Boy Records co-founder in different roles on and off for several years, told the court he banged on her door and told her: “Get dressed, we’re going to kill Mescudi.”

Kid Cudi, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, last week testified himself about the alleged incident in December 2011.

Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence – which marked the start of the third week of the high-profile trial. She told the court her situation working for the hip-hop mogul was “complicated”.

Combs, 55, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution, is accused of subjecting his former long-term partner Cassie and others to years of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs trial: Day 10 – as it happened

Sean 'Diddy' Combs watches as his former assistant Capricorn Clark is questioned by prosecutor Mitzi Steiner at his sex trafficking trial in New York on 27 May 2025. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters
Image:
Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters

While giving her own evidence in the first week of the trial, Cassie told jurors she dated Cudi briefly during a difficult period in her on-off relationship with Combs.

On Tuesday, Ms Clark said she warned Cassie about seeing Cudi, saying she took her to buy a burner phone as she thought it could be dangerous given how Combs might react. “The way she was moving, she was going to get us all killed,” Ms Clark said.

Combs arrived at her home with a gun in his hand on the morning of the attempted confrontation with Cudi, she told the court, and looked “furious”.

She says she told him she did not want to go with him, to which he allegedly replied: “I don’t give a f**k what you want to do.”

Rapper Kid Cudi leaves Federal Court after testifying at the trial of Sean "Diddy" Combs in New York, Thursday, May 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Image:
Rapper Kid Cudi gave evidence last week. Pic: AP/ Richard Drew

Ms Clark said she had never seen “anything like this before”, but got dressed and left with Combs in a black Cadillac to head to the property in the Hollywood Hills.

She said she waited in the car as Combs went into the residence, and called Cassie to warn her. The rapper had her “with a gun and brought me to Cudi’s house to kill him”, she said she told her.

Cudi could be heard in the background of the call, she said, asking: “He’s in my house?”

After the incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs warned her and Cassie not to speak to police and threatened to “kill all you” if they did not convince Cudi not to either.

In the aftermath of this incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs “came at” Cassie with “100% full force”, repeatedly kicking her while she crouched “more and more” into a foetal position and cried “silently”.

The rapper told Ms Clark that if she tried to intervene, “he was going to f**k me up too”, she said.

Janice Combs, mother of Sean "Diddy" Combs, arrives at court.
Pic: Reuters
Image:
Diddy’s mother Janice Combs was in court to support him again. Pic: Reuters

Earlier in her testimony, she told the court about the start of her employment with Combs and his label Bad Boy Records in 2004.

She said after he discovered she had previously worked for Marion “Suge” Knight’s Death Row Records – the West Coast rival to East Coast Bad Boy – he told her “if anything happened, he would have to kill me”.

Ms Clark said she perceived this as a “very serious” threat. She also told the court about another alleged incident just a few weeks into the job, when some diamond jewellery on loan to Combs went missing.

She told the court she was taken to a building in Manhattan and forced to repeatedly take lie detector tests over five days.

Sean "Diddy" Combs speaks with his legal team before court begins for the day at Combs' sex trafficking trial in New York City, New York, U.S., May 27, 2025 in this courtroom sketch. REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg
Image:
Combs with his legal team before court began for the day. Pic: Reuters/ Jane Rosenberg


The man who carried out the test told her that if she failed, “they’re going to throw you in the East River”, she said.

Combs was not present for the tests and never spoke to her about them, she said, when questioned by defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo.

During her testimony, Ms Clark mentioned an incident involving fellow rapper 50 Cent’s manager, after both 50 Cent and Combs had done interviews for MTV.

Combs mentioned to the manager that they had some issues and told him, “I like guns”, she said, which she perceived as a vague threat.

Read more:
Everything you need to know about the Sean Combs trial
The rise and fall of Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs

Ms Clark also described attempting to leave Combs’s home in Miami on one occasion in 2006, when she was allegedly told to “get the f**k back here” by the rapper.

According to Ms Clark, he told her: “Your problem is you want a life, and you can’t have that here.”

The trial continues tomorrow, with evidence expected from LA police and fire officers.

If convicted, Combs could face between 15 years and life in prison.

Continue Reading

UK

Liverpool trophy parade: Man arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and drug offences, police say

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Liverpool trophy parade: Man arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and drug offences, police say

A suspect detained after a car struck pedestrians at a Liverpool FC trophy parade was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, dangerous driving and driving while unfit through drugs, Merseyside Police have said.

The 53-year-old is described as white British and from the West Derby area of Liverpool.

Police say 11 people are still being treated in hospital and are recovering well. A total of 65 people were injured, they said.

Liverpool parade updates: Follow the latest developments

At a press briefing this afternoon, assistant chief constable Jenny Sims said the car followed an ambulance after a road block on Water Street was lifted so paramedics could help a man who had a suspected heart attack.

The car entered the road from Rumford Street, Merseyside Police said.

Map showing where police say the car entered Water Street.

Detectives have said the incident is not being treated as terror-related, and no further suspects are being sought.

“There was no intelligence to suggest an incident of this nature would take place,” Ms Sims said.

She also defended the policing operation during the parade, saying the force planned for “all contingencies”.

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‘From jubilation to sirens’

Her comment came after the city’s metro mayor Steve Rotheram said questions about how the car was able to enter the road were “legitimate”.

The arrested man remains in custody and is being interviewed by officers, police said.

Forensic officers at the scene in Water Street.
Pic: PA
Image:
Pic: PA


Forensic officers at the scene in Water Street.
Pic: PA
Image:
Forensic officers at the scene today. Pic: PA

Merseyside Police is receiving help from neighbouring forces “due to the number of victims”, detective chief superintendent Karen Jaundrill added.

She continued: “Extensive CCTV inquiries are being carried out across the city to establish the movements of the car, a Ford Galaxy, before the incident took place.

“We have already had an incredible response from many of those who were there last night.”

More from Sky News:
Why police released ‘unprecedented’ arrest details
Eyewitnesses describe car driving into crowd

Detective Chief Superintendent Karen Jaundrill and Assistant Chief Constable Jenny Sims from Merseyside Police speaking during a press conference at police headquarters, in Liverpool.
Pic: PA
Image:
Detective chief superintendent Karen Jaundrill and assistant chief constable Jenny Sims speaking at police headquarters. Pic: PA

Couple ‘traumatised’ after being hit

A couple hit by the car told Sky News they have been left “traumatised”.

Jack Trotter and his girlfriend Abbie Gallagher had just met some other Liverpool fans and were taking videos, when the Ford Galaxy quickly approached.

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Victims recall being hit by car

Miss Gallagher told Sky told our communities correspondent Lisa Holland she was separated from her boyfriend as the car struck them both.

“I look around and there’s people in the air,” she said. “I just freaked out. I was just trying to find Jack.

“Luckily enough, he heard me screaming. He came up and said, ‘I’m here’. We didn’t know what to say, we were just crying.”

Royals ‘saddened’ by events

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Princess Anne visits Liverpool after parade crash

Messages of support have been sent to the people of Liverpool since the incident, with the Prince and Princess of Wales saying they were “deeply saddened” by the events.

“What should have been a joyful celebration ended with tragedy,” they added.

Meanwhile, the King, who is currently taking part in a tour of Canada, said: “I know that the strength of community spirit for which your city is renowned will be a comfort and support to those in need.”

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