Reddit Takes Legal Action Against Perplexity and Others for AI Scraping
In a bold move this week, Reddit has taken legal action against Perplexity and three other companies—Oxylabs UAB, AWM Proxy, and Serp Api—for allegedly partaking in AI scraping without authorization. This practice involves the unauthorized collection of vast amounts of data from Reddit, with the intention of profiting from it.
The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in New York, outlines how these companies circumvented Reddit’s security measures to harvest millions of posts. These posts are then often sold to clients seeking data for AI training purposes. Reddit’s Chief Legal Officer, Ben Lee, emphasized the significance of Reddit as a rich source of diverse human conversations, making it an attractive target for such data scraping activities.
This is not the first time Reddit has encountered such issues. In June, the platform initiated a similar lawsuit against Anthropic, an AI company also accused of unauthorized data collection. Furthermore, Reddit made headlines last year when it demanded compensation from Microsoft for utilizing its content for training AI models.
These legal actions highlight the growing concerns surrounding AI scraping and the protection of online content. Reddit’s proactive stance sends a clear message that unauthorized data collection will not be tolerated, setting a precedent for safeguarding digital assets in the ever-evolving landscape of AI technologies.