Daily News, NYT and Tribune papers sued Brave Software alleging it scraped and resold paywalled news to AI firms and its Ask Brave AI reproduced it
The Daily News, the New York Times and affiliated Tribune Publishing newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune and Orlando Sentinel, filed federal lawsuits in Manhattan against Brave Software. They allege Brave scraped content from more than 30 billion webpages without identifying itself, resold the publishers' stories to AI companies including Anthropic and Perplexity, and gave its own users access to paywalled content. The complaint says Brave's 'Ask Brave' AI feature listed 35 paywalled Daily News articles and offered to fetch their full text, and reproduced Orlando Sentinel coverage verbatim. Brave did not respond to a request for comment; the AI companies are not named as defendants.
What the AI did
Brave's AI feature, Ask Brave, allegedly listed the titles of 35 paywalled Daily News articles from that day and offered to fetch their full text. It also allegedly reproduced Orlando Sentinel coverage word for word and closely paraphrased it.
First reported November 2, 2026 · Added to the register November 8, 2026 · 2 sources
- Developer
- Brave Software
- Model
- Ask Brave
- Affected
- Chicago Tribune and Orlando Sentinel, The Daily News, the New York Times and affiliated newspapers
- When it happened
- Not stated in the sources
- First reported
- November 2, 2026
What this means for you
Could this affect you?
If you publish paywalled content or use web-scraped data or search services to feed AI. News publishers whose paywalled stories may be scraped and reproduced by AI search tools, and AI companies buying third-party data that may be alleged to infringe copyright, could be exposed in the same way.
What to check
- Check where any web-scraped data or search services feeding your AI training or answers come from.
- Confirm you hold proper licences for that data.
- Review whether your AI answer features can reproduce paywalled content word for word.
Areas of your AI programme this touches
Timeline
- November 2, 2026First reported
- November 2, 2026The complaint also names Mistral, xAI and Cohere, alongside Anthropic and Perplexity, among the AI companies Brave allegedly provided content to. An NYT spokesperson said Brave ignored repeated requests by The Times to stop its infringing conduct, and Perplexity's chief communications officer dismissed the suit, referring to 'the disinformation in this suit.'[1]
Every fact and its source (9)
- Legal claimsFive claims, including direct, contributory and vicarious copyright infringement“The suit lists five legal claims”[2]
- Company responseBrave did not respond to request for comment“Brave Software, Inc., did not respond to a request for comment.”[2]
- Paywalled articles listed by Ask Brave in one example35 articles“The chatbot provided the titles of 35 articles that appeared in The News that day behind a paywall”[2]
- AI companies alleged to have bought content (not defendants)Anthropic and Perplexity“to resell to AI giants, including Anthropic and Perplexity”[2]
- Scale of alleged crawlingMore than 30 billion webpages“copied content from more than 30 billion webpages in its index”[2]
- Alleged verbatim reproductionReproduced Orlando Sentinel text verbatim and closely paraphrased“the bot reproduced verbatim and closely paraphrased text from the newspaper’s coverage”[2]
- AI companies allegedly supplied with scraped contentAnthropic, Perplexity, Mistral, xAI, Cohere“AI companies including Anthropic, Perplexity, Mistral, xAI, and Cohere”[1]
- NYT allegationBrave ignored repeated NYT requests to stop“ignored repeated requests by The Times to stop its infringing conduct”[1]
- Perplexity responsePerplexity dismissed the suit“The New York Times is overpaying its attorneys and underpaying its journalists.”[1]
Sources
- The New York Times sues Brave web browser for AI scraping and bypassing paywallstheverge.com · November 2, 2026
- Tech company Brave plundered newspapers' content and resold it to AI giants: copyright lawsuit – Scranton Times-Tribunethetimes-tribune.com · November 2, 2026
How this record is classified. Severity N: a legal action or test finding, not a harm. Evidence: Alleged, meaning one party's claim.
The facts in At a glance and in Every fact and its source are quoted from the sources listed. The summary, What the AI did and What this means for you are written from those sources and checked against them automatically before publication. Records reflect what has been disclosed, not everything that has happened. Incidents are found through news feeds and the GDELT Project.
