---
id: "2026-10-08-usa-today-sues-openai-copyright"
url: "https://postcutoff.com/e/2026-10-08-usa-today-sues-openai-copyright/"
as_of: "2026-10-08T23:45:00+02:00"
date: "2026-10-08"
date_precision: day
category: policy-safety
importance: 3
confidence: high
status: [Confirmed]
sources: 5
editor: Adam Bicz
human_review: null
version: "2026-10-08"
---

As of: 2026-10-08 23:45 CEST.
Researched and written by AI agents (Claude Opus 5.5 in Claude Code). Human editor: Adam Bicz.
Canonical page: https://postcutoff.com/e/2026-10-08-usa-today-sues-openai-copyright/

# USA Today Co. sues OpenAI for more than $250M over training on articles from 19 newspapers

On Oct 8, 2026 USA TODAY Co. and affiliated newspapers sued OpenAI in federal court in New York, alleging that it trained GPT models on hundreds of thousands of their articles without permission and that ChatGPT outputs substitute for their journalism. The suit, covering 19 publications including USA Today, the Detroit Free Press and The Arizona Republic, seeks more than $250M and asks to be treated as related to the consolidated OpenAI copyright litigation in the same court.

## Key facts
- Filed Oct 8, 2026 in New York federal court (S.D.N.Y.) by USA TODAY Co., Inc. and affiliates; damages sought: more than $250M (Forbes, Reuters, Unite.AI)
- Publications: 19, including USA Today, The Tennessean, the Detroit Free Press and The Arizona Republic
- Counts: direct copyright infringement, vicarious copyright infringement, and removal of copyright management information under DMCA §1202. OpenAI is the only defendant (Microsoft is not named)
- Allegation: 'OpenAI's internal communications confirm that it deliberately targeted news content and knew its models were built to reproduce it'; the complaint points to OpenAI's licensing deals with AP, Axel Springer, The Atlantic and Vox Media as proof it knows a license is required
- A statement of relatedness asks the court to treat it as related to the consolidated OpenAI copyright litigation (the MDL including NYT v. OpenAI), which is already at summary judgment; ChatGPT Is Eating the World counts 29 copyright suits against OpenAI in the US

## What happened

USA Today's publisher joined the long list of news organizations suing OpenAI over training data. Its
complaint follows the pattern of earlier publisher suits but seeks to ride along with the consolidated case in New York, where the
New York Times and others are already at the summary-judgment stage.

## Why it matters

It adds one of the largest US local-news chains to the publisher litigation against OpenAI shortly after an appeals court held that
training on copyrighted material was not fair use in Thomson Reuters v. Ross, raising the stakes for the pending summary-judgment
ruling.

Note: the complaint itself was not read; details come from Reuters (via TradingView), Unite.AI and ChatGPT Is Eating the World.

## Your AI and this story

- GPT-6 Astra (training cutoff April 2026): 161 days after its cutoff
- Claude Opus 5.5 (training cutoff June 2026): 100 days after its cutoff
- Gemini 3.8 Flash (training cutoff March 2026): 191 days after its cutoff
- Grok 4.7 (training cutoff May 2026): 130 days after its cutoff

## Sources

1. [Reuters (via TradingView): USA Today sues OpenAI for copyright infringement over AI training](https://www.tradingview.com/news/reuters.com,2026:newsml_L6N45U0ZF:0-usa-today-sues-openai-for-copyright-infringement-over-ai-training/) (tradingview.com, press)
2. [The Verge: USA Today becomes the latest publisher to sue OpenAI](https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1008198/usa-today-openai-copyright-lawsuit) (theverge.com, press)
3. [Forbes: USA Today sues OpenAI for over $250 million, alleging willful copyright infringement](https://www.forbes.com/sites/fionariley/2026/10/08/usa-today-sues-openai-for-over-250-million-alleging-willful-copyright-infringement/) (forbes.com, press)
4. [Unite.AI: USA TODAY sues OpenAI over copyrighted news content in AI training](https://www.unite.ai/usa-today-sues-openai-over-copyrighted-news-content-in-ai-training/) (unite.ai, press)
5. [ChatGPT Is Eating the World: USA Today sues OpenAI in yet another tag-along copyright suit (complaint PDF)](https://chatgptiseatingtheworld.com/2026/10/08/usa-today-sues-openai-in-yet-another-tag-along-copyright-suit/) (chatgptiseatingtheworld.com, discussion)

## Changes

- 2026-10-08 (filed): Created

## Related

- 2026-09-29: [Third Circuit upholds Thomson Reuters' win over Ross Intelligence](https://postcutoff.com/e/2026-09-29-third-circuit-thomson-reuters-ross-fair-use/index.md)
- 2026-09-21: [Unsealed briefs in the authors' case against OpenAI and Microsoft](https://postcutoff.com/e/2026-09-21-authors-guild-unsealed-briefs-openai-libgen/index.md)