Reddit Sues Perplexity and Data Scraping Firms for Unauthorized Data Use

Reddit Inc. has initiated legal action against Perplexity AI Inc. and three data scraping service providers for allegedly using its copyrighted content to train AI models without permission.

The companies involved, including SerpApi, Oxylabs, and AWMProxy, were likened to 'bank robbers' by Reddit, which accused them of avoiding direct agreements to obtain Reddit data, unlike some competitors.

Several AI firms, such as OpenAI, have already secured agreements with Reddit, reportedly worth $60 million, to use its data for AI model training. Reddit aims to generate $200 million from such licensing deals over the next three years.

Reddit has also filed a lawsuit against Anthropic PBC, marking this as one of several ongoing legal battles. Data scraping firms have emerged recently following the rise of generative AI technologies.

Ben Lee, Reddit's chief legal officer, commented on the competitive environment for quality human content, describing it as fueling a 'data laundering' economy.

The lawsuit details a trap set by Reddit for Perplexity, involving a 'test post' visible only to Google's search engine, which later appeared in Perplexity's search results.

Perplexity has stated it has not yet received the lawsuit but intends to defend users' rights to access public knowledge freely and fairly.