On March 13, Reuters reported that Brave Software, a Google search engine competitor, has filed a lawsuit against News Corp to prevent anticipated legal action from Rupert Murdoch's company. The dispute centers on the indexing of copyrighted articles from the Wall Street Journal and New York Post. Brave contends that News Corp accused them of copyright infringement for indexing content, which Brave argues falls under "fair use" necessary for search engine operations.
Additionally, Brave claimed that News Corp's actions could hinder the development of generative artificial intelligence, crucial for technologies like chatbots. Despite having a small market share in search (less than 1%), Brave accused News Corp of colluding with Google to suppress competition and raise market entry barriers significantly.
News Corp's CEO Robert Thomson rebuffed Brave's allegations, condemning their indexing practices as parasitical and unauthorized resale of copyrighted material. He emphasized that such actions harm content creators. The lawsuit mirrors the escalating conflict between publishers and tech firms over the unauthorized use of copyrighted material to fuel AI developments.
News Corp previously accused the startup Perplexity AI of illicitly copying its content. In response, News Corp accused Brave of profiting from stolen content and harming journalism by re-selling it without proper authorization.
Brave's lawsuit aims to establish that indexing and licensing News Corp articles for searchable databases are not copyright violations.