Rupert Murdoch’s Dow Jones and the New York Post filed a lawsuit in New York on Monday, accusing the AI startup Perplexity of a "brazen scheme" to copy their journalism for use in its AI-driven search engine. The suit alleges that Perplexity is engaging in "massive illegal copying" of content produced by their news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, diverting critical revenues from the publishers.

The AI search engine reportedly uses large language models (LLMs) to generate instant answers to user questions, drawing on material from various news sources. The lawsuit claims that Perplexity's business model relies on scraping copyrighted content at a large scale, offering users responses that substitute for direct visits to news websites. This, according to the lawsuit, constitutes copyright infringement.

This legal battle adds to the mounting tension between AI companies and traditional media outlets over the use of content to train machine learning models. While some, like OpenAI, have pursued licensing deals with publishers to use their content, others face increasing legal challenges. For instance, the New York Times recently filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, following a "cease and desist" notice to Perplexity over similar concerns.

The lawsuit also accuses Perplexity of damaging the publishers' brands by falsely attributing content and generating responses with inaccurate information. Despite a prior letter from Dow Jones and the New York Post offering to discuss a potential licensing deal, the AI startup did not respond, according to the legal filing.

News Corp CEO Robert Thomson criticized Perplexity for what he described as "willfully copying copious amounts of copyrighted material without compensation" and passing it off as original content. This lawsuit reflects a broader concern in the publishing industry, as AI tools increasingly rely on third-party content to train models and generate outputs.

Perplexity has yet to respond to the lawsuit, but it previously announced plans for a revenue-sharing initiative and indicated that it would reduce reliance on scraping technologies. The company also hinted at introducing advertising to its platform, potentially courting brands aligned with news outlets in an effort to drive revenue.