Asahi and Nikkei sue Perplexity for copyright infringement
Japan's Asahi Shimbun and Nikkei Inc. filed a lawsuit against U.S. generative AI company Perplexity AI, Inc. in Tokyo District Court on August 26, 2025, alleging copyright infringement and unfair competition. The newspapers claim Perplexity copied and displayed their articles without permission in search results, including paywalled content, despite robots.txt prohibitions, and seeks 44 billion yen in damages and injunctive relief.",
What happened
Perplexity AI operates a generative AI search service that collects information from the internet related to user queries and provides AI-generated responses. The Asahi Shimbun Company and Nikkei Inc. allege that Perplexity copied and stored their article content from their servers without permission and since at least June 2024 has repeatedly displayed responses containing these articles to users.
Both newspapers had implemented robots.txt technical measures on their websites to prohibit unauthorized use of their content, but Perplexity ignored these restrictions and continued to use the material. The unauthorized content includes articles behind Nikkei's paywall accessible only to paid subscribers and articles distributed by Asahi to partner platforms.
Reported impact
The plaintiffs allege that Perplexity's actions constitute copyright infringement, specifically violating the right of reproduction, adaptation right, and the right to transmit to the public. Additionally, they claim Perplexity displays false facts alongside citations of their social names and articles, constituting unfair competition.
The newspapers argue that if this situation is allowed to continue, the foundation of all news organizations committed to accurate reporting will be destroyed, potentially threatening the roots of democracy.
Index analysis
Experts note that copyright law's Article 30-4 covers generative AI training but does not adequately address non-trivial uses of content by AI companies. A Tokyo University intellectual property law professor stated that news organizations spending significant resources on fact-gathering receive no compensation for their content used by AI companies, which represents an improper value distribution.
Governance controls
Both newspapers implemented robots.txt technical measures to indicate their prohibition of unauthorized content use, but Perplexity disregarded this measure. The newspapers are seeking an injunction against copyright infringement and public transmission, deletion of stored articles, and cessation of displaying false facts alongside their names.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.