Merriam-Webster and its parent company Encyclopedia Britannica are the latest to take on AI in court. The plaintiffs have sued Perplexity, claiming that AI company’s “answer engine” product unlawfully copies their copyrighted materials. They are also alleging copyright infringement for instances where Perplexity’s AI creates false or inaccurate hallucinations that it then wrongly attributes to Britannica or Merriam-Webster. The complaint, filed in New York federal court, is seeking unspecified monetary damages and an order that blocks Perplexity from misusing their content.
“Perplexity’s so-called “answer engine” eliminates users’ clicks on Plaintiffs’ and other web publishers’ websites—and, in turn, starves web publishers of revenue—by generating responses to users’ queries that substitute the content from other information websites,” the filing reads. “To build its substitute product, Perplexity engages in massive copying of Plaintiffs’ and other web publishers’ protected content without authorization or remuneration.”
This isn’t Perplexity’s first time facing allegations that it has unlawfully taken another website’s content. Last year, the AI company was accused of copyright infringement by the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post. Just last month a pair of Japanese media companies, Nikkei and the Asahi Shimbun, sued it on similar claims.
