⚖️ CNN Files Lawsuit Against Perplexity
CNN has filed a lawsuit against the AI company Perplexity in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The news giant accuses the startup of illegally copying and distributing its content without prior consent.
This marks the first legal action of its kind initiated by a television network, though Perplexity has previously faced similar lawsuits from publishers including The New York Times, Dow Jones, and the New York Post.
According to the 54-page complaint, Perplexity scraped more than 17,000 CNN materials—including articles, photographs, and videos—to train its AI products. CNN noted that it had attempted to negotiate a licensing agreement with the startup last year, but after talks collapsed, the network blocked Perplexity’s web crawlers from accessing its site.
Furthermore, the plaintiffs allege trademark infringement, claiming that the AI platform offered users a premium subscription tier called Comet Plus, marketing it as providing access to exclusive CNN materials despite the lack of any formal partnership.
CNN representatives emphasized that high-quality journalism requires significant investment, and commercial operators are obligated to pay for the use of intellectual property. In response, Perplexity issued a concise comment, stating that “facts are not copyrightable.”
The television network is asking the court to enjoin Perplexity from using its materials and is seeking monetary damages from the startup.
Source: Variety
