OpenAI tells India court ChatGPT data removal will breach US legal obligations
OpenAI has informed an Indian court that any directive to eliminate the training data supporting its ChatGPT service would go against its legal responsibilities in the United States. This communication was revealed in a recent submission reviewed by Reuters. The AI company, backed by Microsoft, asserted that Indian courts do not have jurisdiction to address a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by local news agency ANI since OpenAI does not have a presence in the country.
In a significant lawsuit involving the use of AI in India, ANI lodged a complaint against OpenAI in Delhi last November, alleging that the AI firm used the news agency's content without authorization to train ChatGPT. OpenAI responded to this lawsuit by ANI, which also requests the deletion of ANI's data already stored by ChatGPT, in a detailed 86-page filing submitted to the Delhi High Court on January 10.
Legal Challenges
OpenAI, along with other companies, has encountered a series of legal challenges from notable copyright holders who claim their work was misused to train AI models. This includes a lawsuit filed by the New York Times against OpenAI in the US. OpenAI has consistently refuted these accusations, stating that their AI systems appropriately utilize publicly available data.
During a hearing in November, OpenAI assured the Delhi court that it would cease using ANI's content. However, ANI argued that their published works were still retained in ChatGPT's memory and demanded their removal. In the January 10 submission, OpenAI explained that it is currently embroiled in litigation in the US regarding the data used to train its models. US laws mandate the preservation of this data while legal proceedings are ongoing, imposing a legal obligation on OpenAI to retain, rather than delete, the training data.
Jurisdiction Matters
OpenAI highlighted in its filing that it does not have a physical presence in India and that the servers storing ChatGPT's training data are located outside the country. ANI, a company in which Reuters holds a 26% stake, expressed its belief that the Delhi court has the authority to adjudicate on the case and stated its intention to submit a detailed response.
The court in New Delhi is scheduled to hear the case on January 28. OpenAI has been preparing to transition from a non-profit organization to a for-profit entity, aiming to secure additional funding to maintain its competitive edge in the expensive AI industry after raising $6.6 billion the previous year.
Concluding Remarks
In recent times, OpenAI has entered into partnerships with various media outlets such as Time magazine, the Financial Times, Axel Springer (the owner of Business Insider), Le Monde in France, and Prisa Media in Spain to showcase content. ANI has expressed concerns about unfair competition due to OpenAI's commercial collaborations with other news organizations. ANI alleged that ChatGPT reproduces verbatim or substantially similar excerpts of their works in response to user prompts.
OpenAI countered ANI's claims by asserting that ANI utilized verbatim extracts of its own articles as prompts to manipulate ChatGPT.
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