From Ars Technica · · 2m
NYT sues Brave over paywall bypass and AI deals
The New York Times and other publishers sued Brave Software for illegally bypassing paywalls and selling news content to AI companies without permission.
In brief
The New York Times and other publishers sued Brave Software for illegally bypassing paywalls and selling news content to AI companies without permission. The New York Times sued Brave Software for bypassing paywalls, scraping articles for its search index, and selling content to AI firms including Anthropic and…
Times sues Brave over stolen content
The New York Times sued Brave Software in US District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging the browser maker illegally bypasses paywalls and sells stolen news content to AI companies.
Brave's alleged AI partnerships
The lawsuit claims Brave sells content to major AI firms including Anthropic, Perplexity, Mistral, xAI, and Cohere, which use it to train models and respond to user queries.
Over one hundred million in alleged profits
The Times cited third-party revenue estimates claiming Brave made more than one hundred million dollars by copying and reselling publishers' work without consent, while publishers received nothing.
How the paywall blocker works
Brave's browser includes a default paywall blocker feature that bypasses website paywalls and provides paywalled content to users. The feature blocks advertising and shows Brave's own ads instead.
“The Brave Browser includes a default setting that, when activated, causes the browser to go behind website paywalls and provide the paywalled content to the user.”
Multiple copyright infringement claims
The lawsuit accuses Brave of direct infringement by scraping articles for its search index and Ask Brave feature, contributory infringement by facilitating AI companies' copying, and violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Times seeks profits and injunction
The New York Times asked for a permanent injunction stopping Brave's conduct and seeks statutory damages, actual damages, and disgorgement of all revenue and profits Brave obtained through its schemes.
Other publishers join the lawsuit
The New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, and Orlando Sentinel companies filed a similar lawsuit against Brave in the same court yesterday, accusing the browser of laundering pirated reporting for the AI industry.
“Brave must be held responsible for laundering pirated reporting for the AI industry.”
Perplexity denies disinformation claims
Perplexity, facing its own separate lawsuit from the Times, accused the news organization of spreading disinformation but did not identify specific inaccuracies in the Brave lawsuit.
“The New York Times is overpaying its attorneys and underpaying its journalists.”
What matters most
The New York Times sued Brave Software for bypassing paywalls, scraping articles for its search index, and selling content to AI firms including Anthropic and Perplexity without publisher consent.
