- A group of US visual artists filed a copyright lawsuit against Google in a federal court in California.
- Allegation: Google used its work without permission to train Imagen, its AI image generator.
- The lawsuit highlights the broader trend of copyright holders challenging tech companies over data usage for AI training.
- Google defends its practices, citing reliance on publicly available internet data.
- Artists demand monetary damages and deletion of their work from Google’s systems.
Main AI News:
Google faces a fresh legal battle as a group of visual artists from the United States filed a copyright lawsuit against the tech giant in a California federal court. The artists, including photographer Jingna Zhang and cartoonists Sarah Andersen, Hope Larson, and Jessica Fink, allege that Google unlawfully utilized their work to train Imagen, its AI-powered image generator, without obtaining proper permission.
The lawsuit, filed in a proposed class action on Friday, accuses Google of incorporating “billions” of copyrighted images, including those of the plaintiffs, to educate Imagen on responding to human text prompts. This legal action underscores a broader trend of copyright holders challenging tech companies like Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Meta over the utilization of data to train generative AI systems.
Responding to the allegations, Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda defended the company’s practices, stating that their AI models primarily rely on publicly available internet data. Castaneda emphasized that American law traditionally supports the use of public information for innovative purposes, and Google intends to contest the claims in court.
However, attorneys representing the artists, Joseph Saveri and Matthew Butterick, condemned Google’s actions, labeling them as another instance of a tech giant leveraging copyrighted content without consent, credit, or compensation for commercial AI endeavors.
Notably, this lawsuit mirrors a similar ongoing legal battle involving Zhang and Andersen against Stability AI, Midjourney, and other entities accused of misusing their work to train AI image generators. The plaintiffs allege that Google utilized datasets identical to those employed by Stability AI and Midjourney to train its own AI system, Imagen.
In their plea to the court, the artists seek unspecified monetary damages and demand an order for Google to delete all copies of their work from its systems, highlighting the growing tension between tech innovation and intellectual property rights.
Conclusion:
The lawsuit brought by US artists against Google signals a significant legal challenge in the tech industry, particularly regarding the use of copyrighted material for AI training. As copyright holders become more vigilant in protecting their intellectual property, tech companies may face increased scrutiny and potential legal liabilities, impacting their AI development strategies and prompting greater emphasis on obtaining proper permissions and licenses for data usage.
