In a proposed class-action lawsuit filed in San Francisco federal court, Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., is accused of misusing vast amounts of personal information and copyrighted material for training its artificial intelligence systems. The plaintiffs, who seek to represent millions of internet users and copyright holders, argue that Google’s unauthorized scraping of data from websites violates their privacy and property rights.
The attorney representing the plaintiffs, Ryan Clarkson, emphasized that Google does not have ownership rights over the internet, creative works, personal expressions, or any other content simply because it is shared online.
“We have only recently learned that Google has been taking everything ever created or shared online by millions of internet users, including all our personal information, creative works, and professional works, and using all of that data to train and build commercial AI Products,” said Ryan Clarkson, managing partner of Clarkson. “Google harvested this data in secret for years, without providing notice to anyone, much less with anyone’s consent. Google does not own the internet, it does not own our creative works, it does not own our expressions of our personhood, pictures of our families and children, or anything else simply because we share it online.”
In June, Clarkson’s law firm had previously filed a similar lawsuit against Microsoft-backed OpenAI, also involving data scraping. The plaintiffs in both cases have requested to remain anonymous due to reported violent threats against individuals involved in similar lawsuits.
The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday, suggests that Google could potentially owe at least $5 billion in damages. However, Google’s general counsel, Halimah DeLaine Prado, stated that the company has been transparent about its use of data from public sources, such as open web information and public datasets, to train AI models responsibly and in accordance with their AI Principles. Prado expressed confidence in refuting the “baseless claims” and highlighted that American law supports the use of public information for beneficial purposes.
This case is among several lawsuits that have emerged over the past year, targeting companies in the thriving AI industry. Meta Platforms, Microsoft, and OpenAI have also faced legal action over allegations of mishandling personal data and using copyrighted books, visual art, and source code without proper authorization for training their AI systems.
The eight plaintiffs involved in the present lawsuit, identified by their initials, assert that Google misused their content posted on social media platforms and shared on Google’s own services to train its chatbot Bard and other generative AI systems. The range of content mentioned in the lawsuit includes photos from dating websites, Spotify playlists, and TikTok videos. One plaintiff, identified as J.L., a best-selling Texan author and investigative journalist, claimed that Google copied her entire book to train Bard.
In their legal filing, the plaintiffs requested the court to compel Google to allow internet users to opt out of the company’s “illicit data collection” practices. Additionally, they seek either the deletion of existing data or fair compensation for the content owners whose data was used without consent.
This class-action lawsuit against Google highlights the ongoing debate surrounding data privacy and the ethical use of personal information in AI training. The outcome of this legal battle could have far-reaching implications for how tech companies collect, use, and protect user data in the future.
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