recent,JapanThe publishing industry has issued serious warnings about AI-driven search engines, believing that these emerging technologies are eroding the foundations of the news industry. The Japan News Publishers and Editors Association said that AI search engines are exploiting news media content without fair compensation, a phenomenon known as "free riding." In other words, AI systems are profiting from news content without supporting the creation of content and the news ecosystem.
Some experts point out that as generative AI systems continue to develop, new copyright laws may emerge to address potential infringement issues. These AI systems can automatically generate complex text content from multiple sources, which has caused a lot of controversy. For example, when someone asked about the death toll of the Noto Peninsula earthquake on January 1, 2024, Google's AI search engine returned this answer: "As of June 19, the Noto Peninsula earthquake caused 282 deaths." This information is obviously a combination of reports from multiple TV stations and major newspapers, and is even almost exactly the same as the content of some newspaper reports.
The Japanese publishing industry believes that this behavior violates Japan's copyright law, because the law only allows the use of a small amount of limited content for search purposes. More seriously, they are worried that this practice will encourage the spread of false information and may cause "irreversible damage" to the foundations of democracy and national culture.
Similar concerns have emerged in the United States and Europe, with growing criticism of search engines such as Perplexity and Google AI Overview. These services exploit website content but fail to effectively drive traffic, which may threaten the business model of content creators who rely on direct website visits for revenue.
In this context, the Japan Publishing Association called for a review of the legal system to cope with the challenges posed by generative AI technology. With the rapid development of AI technology, how to protect the rights of content creators has become an urgent issue to be resolved.