A coalition of Canada's leading news organizations, including the Toronto Star, Metroland Media, Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, and CBC, has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI.

They accuse the creators of ChatGPT of using their news articles without authorization to train its AI software.

This lawsuit is the first of its kind in Canada and seeks C$20,000 per allegedly infringed article, potentially totaling billions of dollars.

The media coalition argues that OpenAI violated copyright protections and paywall restrictions in its data scraping process.

OpenAI defends its practices, stating its models use 'publicly available data' grounded in 'fair use' principles, offering an option for publishers to opt out.

The coalition demands damages, profit-sharing, and an injunction against future use of their content.

This lawsuit mirrors efforts in the US, where entities like the New York Times have brought similar claims against AI firms.

OpenAI was recently valued at C$219 billion following a fundraising round, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.