Major publishers sue Google over alleged copyright infringement in Gemini AI training

Google faces another AI training lawsuit from major publishers

A group of publishers and authors have filed a class action lawsuit against Google, accusing the tech giant of using their copyrighted works to train its AI platform, Gemini. The group of plaintiffs, which includes Hachette, Cengage, Elsevier, author Scott Turow, and S.C.R.I.B.E., also alleges that Google intentionally removed or changed copyright information on these works to "conceal... that its Gemini Models were trained on stolen materials," according to the lawsuit. This lawsuit is just one of many complaints that publishers, authors, and other copyright holders have filed against AI companies such as Google, Meta, OpenAI, and Anthropic. While many of these lawsuits are still pending, two early court decisions in California have favored the AI companies, ruling that the use of copyrighted works for AI training is considered "fair use" under U.S. copyright law that has not been updated since before the existence of the internet. Anthropic was, however, fined $1.5 billion for pirating the works it trained on, marking the largest payout in the history of U.S. copyright law. Around half a million writers were eligible for payments of at least $3,000. However, many authors opted out of receiving the settlement so that they could pursue further legal action over AI training. The California judges' decisions don't bode well for how other courts may view the tech companies' fair use defense, but the conflict is too nuanced for these rulings to establish an inarguable precedent. The lawsuit against Google was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, giving a different judge the opportunity to weigh in. In the Google case, the publishers have a more nuanced, long-term relationship with the company. The lawsuit explains that publishers and authors have a long history of providing Google with copyrighted works for the specific purpose of making books searchable through Google Books. These search results do not allow users to view entire books. Instead, they provide access to short snippets of the book along with bibliographic information. The plaintiffs claim that Google trained Gemini on copies of these books, as well as books uploaded to the Google Play store, even though it never received permission to do so. "Google illegally copied works from all these scope-limited programs for AI training, knowing it lacked authorization to do so," the lawsuit reads. The plaintiffs also cite an internal document from Google that allegedly states that using copyrighted books for AI training could be "highly problematic for Google" and might result in "$10Bs-$100Bs in potential fines." Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Google Faces Another Lawsuit Alleging Its AI Violated Copyrights

Google "cashed in" on its relationships with publishers to share their works online "by brazenly copying millions of copyrighted works" to train its AI in violation of copyright law, a new lawsuit from publishers and authors alleges. Hachette Book Group, Cengage, Elsevier and author Scott Turow filed the lawsuit in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on July 10. If those names sound familiar, it may be because they teamed with publishers McGraw-Hill and Macmillan to sue Meta over similar claims in May. "The scale and speed at which Gemini can create books and compete with human writers is unprecedented," the complaint says, "and it can only do that because Google copied plaintiffs' and the class's works to train its AI." Google and lawyers for the publishers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. In this specific case, the publishers are claiming that Google used their copyrighted content, available on the web and through Google Books, to train Gemini, without permission or compensation. This is a common claim among the many copyright infringement lawsuits brought against AI companies. Copyright is one of the most contentious legal issues for generative AI. Companies making AI need vast quantities of data to make their models better. Humans create much of that data, and a lot of what humans create is copyright-protected. So when AI companies scrape this data from the open web or acquire it through other means, lawsuits abound. Google has been sued for copyright infringement before. Disney slapped Google with a cease-and-desist order in December, when its Nano Banana AI image model and other video models were, in Disney's words, taking a "free ride off Disney's intellectual property" by creating AI content featuring its iconic characters. AI has become one of the most controversial issues in publishing. Hachette canceled the US release of horror novel Shy Girl by Mia Ballard after multiple allegations that she used generative AI to write the book, angering the book community and violating the publisher's rules. In two major copyright lawsuits against Anthropic and Meta, the courts last year sided with the AI companies. But both judges were careful to say that future cases could swing the other way. In the new lawsuit from Hachette and others, the plaintiffs wrote, "Copyright law applies to AI companies, including Google, with the same force as every other company that has complied with these laws for decades."

Three publishers challenge Google over AI copyright infringement - Engadget

It's the latest in a barrage of efforts to win compensation from AI companies over training materials. A trio of publishers and one author are seeking a class action lawsuit against Google on claims that the tech company broke copyright law by using their works to train its Gemini AI. Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning and Elsevier are the plaintiff companies and writer Scott Turow is the individual behind this effort. "Google reproduced millions of copyrighted works without permission, without providing any compensation to authors or publishers, and with full knowledge that its conduct violated copyright law," the complaint alleges. "Google also stripped CMI from the copyrighted works it stole to conceal its training sources and facilitate their unauthorized use." In addition to the alleged copyright infringement for training, the complaint argues that Gemini allows and sometimes even encourages the creation of copycat works, again without credit or compensation to the authors or their publishers. The suit states that: "Google also knows that absent appropriate guardrails, Gemini will continue to produce outputs that substitute for copyrighted works on which it was trained. Yet Google has failed to implement effective guardrails." The literary world has made several attempts to make deals with the AI companies that have scraped and trained large language models off of their protected works. In fact, a group including several of the same parties already have a similar class action suit underway against Meta. However, cases based on copyright infringement haven't seen much success to date. A separate group of writers landed an initial settlement of $1.5 billion with Anthropic in 2025 for a copyright infringement-turned-piracy case against the Claude chatbot creator, but it was rejected by the judge overseeing the case for being "nowhere near complete." Similar efforts by authors to tackle copyright infringement by Meta's AI operation fell short last year. A different pair of authors has also tried to take on Apple for unlicensed use of their creations for AI training. That's just a sampling from the publishing world.

Hatchette and Elsevier Sue Google for Using Their Work to Train AI

Major publishers Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, and Elsevier have filed a lawsuit against Google alleging that Google used their work to train its AI chatbot Gemini. Scott Turow, the author of crime thrillers like Presumed Innocent, has also joined the suit which is seeking class action status. The lawsuit was filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York alleging that Google "reproduced millions of copyrighted works without permission, without providing any compensation to authors or publishers, and with full knowledge that its conduct violated copyright law." Hachette is the third largest book publisher in the U.S. behind Penguin Random House and HarperCollins, the latter of which signed a licensing deal with Microsoft in 2024 to provide its books to be training AI models, according to Bloomberg. Cengage Learning is a large education publisher that provides access to educational materials like textbooks and Elsevier is an academic publisher of journals like The Lancet and Cell. The plaintiffs allege Google illegally copied their books and journal articles, including from "known pirate sources," to train its AI models. From the lawsuit: The result is an AI system that competes directly with Plaintiffs' and the Class's works in the market. Those substitutes take multiple forms, including verbatim and near-verbatim copies of portions or entire works, replacement chapters of academic textbooks, summaries and alternative versions of famous novels, and inferior knockoffs that copy creative elements of original works. Gemini even tailors outputs to mimic the expressive elements and creative choices of specific authors. Elsevier, Cengage, Turow, and Hachette all sued Meta earlier this year over allegations that it used their work to train AI. The copyright harm outlined in the suit The new suit against Google argues that Gemini creates a product that traditional publishers can't compete with, claiming that an AI chatbot can instantly create a 100-page murder mystery in 20 minutes "for a mere $0.39." "The scale and speed at which Gemini can create books and compete with human writers is unprecedented, and it can only do that because Google copied Plaintiffs' and the Class's works to train its AI," the lawsuit claims. The publishers also claim that all of Google's copyright infringement was willful and if it wanted to properly license their content for training purposes, that was something the tech giant could've paid for. The lawsuit notes the incredible amount of money that Google makes each quarter ($100 billion revenue in Oct. 2025) and says that's driven by Google's AI business. Gemini has over 650 million monthly active users. "While AI technology may be new, the legal principles at the center of this case are not," the lawsuit says. "Copyright law applies to AI companies, including Google, with the same force as every other company that has complied with these laws for decades." "If left unaddressed, Google will continue to infringe Plaintiffs' and the Class's rights, cause broad and lasting damage to the literary industry and authors, and weaken the incentive to create that is at the core of the Copyright Act." Google didn't respond to questions emailed Tuesday. Gizmodo will update this article if we hear back.

Book publishers sue Google for copyright infringement over Gemini AI training

Group of major publishers accuses the tech giant of 'one of the most prolific infringements of copyrighted materials in history' A group of major publishers have filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the company of illegally using millions of copyrighted books to help build its Gemini artificial intelligence models, in "one of the most prolific infringements of copyrighted materials in history". The case, filed in federal court in New York, has been brought by three publishers - Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, and Elsevier - and bestselling American author Scott Turow. The publishers argue that Google repurposed books that had been supplied for limited services such as Google Books, Google Play Books and Google Scholar. Those services allowed Google to use the works in specific ways - for example, to display searchable snippets or sell ebooks - but not, the lawsuit claims, to copy them for training commercial AI products. "Desperate to maintain its online dominance, Google abandoned its early motto of 'Don't be evil' and engaged in one of the most prolific infringements of copyrighted materials in history," the suit states. According to the complaint, the tech company made copies of copyrighted books to train Gemini without permission or payment, despite internal discussions acknowledging the legal risks. The filing claims Google flagged internally that it could face "$10Bs-$100Bs in potential fines" for using texts provided by publishers for Google Play Books. The publishers say Google's actions are harming authors and the wider publishing industry, arguing that AI-generated content could negatively impact book sales. It notes that, for example, Gemini could generate "a 100-page murder mystery set in a quiet seaside town filled with secrets, that substitutes for an original copyrighted murder mystery on which Gemini trained" in 20 minutes for 39 cents. "No publisher or author can compete with that." The lawsuit names a number of specific books that the publishers allege were among the copyrighted works used without permission, including NK Jemisin's The Fifth Season, and Lemony Snicket's Who Could That Be at This Hour? The case adds to a growing legal battle over generative AI and copyright. Authors and publishers have filed a series of lawsuits against Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and Meta, alleging that their copyrighted works were used without permission to train AI models. These include a copyright lawsuit brought by a group of authors in which a judge ruled in Meta's favour last June, and a landmark settlement in which Anthropic agreed to pay $1.5bn to authors who alleged pirated copies of their books were used to train the AI chatbot Claude. Earlier this year, thousands of authors including Kazuo Ishiguro, Philippa Gregory and Richard Osman published an "empty" book to protest against AI firms using their work without permission. The new case follows an earlier attempt by Hachette and Cengage to join an existing copyright lawsuit against Google brought by authors and illustrators in 2023. Google has opposed their participation in that case, prompting the publishers to launch a separate action. The plaintiffs are seeking statutory damages, a permanent injunction preventing Google from continuing the alleged infringement, and a court order requiring the company to destroy any unauthorised copies of their works used in training its AI systems. Google did not respond to a Guardian request for comment.

Publishers sue Google over alleged use of books to train AI models

Book publishers sued Google on Tuesday, accusing the tech giant of illegally using copyrighted works to train its artificial intelligence models and generate content that competes with human authors. The lawsuit marks the latest legal battle over how AI developers use books and other creative works to build their systems. Multiple book publishers sued Google on Tuesday for allegedly stealing copyrighted content, using it to train artificial intelligence (AI) models and then generating content that "directly" competes with the original authors' work. "The scale and speed at which Gemini can create books and compete with human writers is unprecedented," the lawsuit says. The lawsuit, which requests class action status, was filed in New York by Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, Elsevier, author Scott Turow and his publishing company S.C.R.I.B.E. They allege that "Google secretly copied millions of works" that were provided to Google Books and other services for "limited purposes" and then used that content to train Gemini, its AI model. Furthermore, they claim the content generated by Gemini directly competes with the authors who wrote the original work. "Gemini even tailors outputs to mimic the expressive elements and creative choices of specific authors," the lawsuit says. Read moreCould a controversial award-winning short story signal a new era of literary 'AI slop'? The plaintiffs requested an injunction and an unspecified amount of damages. It's the latest copyright infringement lawsuit brought against AI developers. In May, multiple publishers - including Hachette, Cengage, Elsevier and Turow - sued Meta on similar grounds in a New York court. A US judge in September approved a $1.5 billion settlement between Anthropic and several authors who claimed the San Francisco company illegally copied their work to train its AI model, Claude. It was a partial victory for Anthropic - a judge ruled that the company's use of books to train Claude was transformative enough to constitute "fair use" under US law but that other uses of pirated materials were not. Meta also won a partial victory last year when a US judge in San Francisco ruled that its use of copyrighted materials was "fair use". That case was filed by comedian Sarah Silverman, author Ta-Nehisi Coates and others.

Publishers accuse Google of stealing copyrighted content in new lawsuit

Multiple book publishers sued Google on Tuesday for allegedly stealing copyrighted content, using it to train artificial intelligence (AI) models and then generating content that "directly" competes with the original authors' work. Furthermore, they claim the content generated by Gemini directly competes with the authors who wrote the original work. Washington: Multiple book publishers sued Google on Tuesday for allegedly stealing copyrighted content, using it to train artificial intelligence (AI) models and then generating content that "directly" competes with the original authors' work. "The scale and speed at which Gemini can create books and compete with human writers is unprecedented," the lawsuit says. The lawsuit, which requests class action status, was filed in New York by Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, Elsevier, author Scott Turow and his publishing company S.C.R.I.B.E. Also read: Writers Guild sues to block Paramount deal, saying it would hurt writers They allege that "Google secretly copied millions of works" that were provided to Google Books and other services for "limited purposes" and then used that content to train Gemini, its AI model. Furthermore, they claim the content generated by Gemini directly competes with the authors who wrote the original work. "Gemini even tailors outputs to mimic the expressive elements and creative choices of specific authors," the lawsuit says. The plaintiffs requested an injunction and an unspecified amount of damages. It's the latest copyright infringement lawsuit brought against AI developers. In May, multiple publishers -- including Hachette, Cengage, Elsevier and Turow -- sued Meta on similar grounds in a New York court. A US judge in September approved a $1.5 billion settlement between Anthropic and several authors who claimed the San Francisco company illegally copied their work to train its AI model, Claude. Also read: Apple sues OpenAI, two former employees for trade secrets theft It was a partial victory for Anthropic -- a judge ruled that the company's use of books to train Claude was transformative enough to constitute "fair use" under US law but that other uses of pirated materials was not. Meta also won a partial victory last year when a US judge in San Francisco ruled that its use of copyrighted materials was "fair use." That case was filed by comedian Sarah Silverman, author Ta-Nehisi Coates and others.