Encyclopedia Britannica has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the company of using its copyrighted content without permission to train AI models. The lawsuit claims OpenAI illegally used Britannica's articles at a massive scale and that ChatGPT sometimes reproduces full or partial verbatim excerpts from the encyclopedia. Britannica also alleges trademark infringement, arguing that ChatGPT's hallucinations falsely attribute made-up content to the company.

This legal battle isn't Britannica's first against AI companies. In September, the company, which owns Merriam-Webster, sued Perplexity for similar reasons. The lawsuit seeks an injunction to prevent OpenAI from continuing these practices, though it doesn't specify monetary damages. Britannica's legal action reflects growing tensions between traditional content creators and AI developers over intellectual property rights.

OpenAI maintains that its models are trained on publicly available data and grounded in fair use. The company argues that ChatGPT enhances human creativity and advances scientific discovery. This case joins other high-profile lawsuits against OpenAI, including one from The New York Times, as the tech industry grapples with the legal and ethical implications of AI training practices.