Unsealed NYT v. OpenAI Court Filings Reveal Executives Privately Called AI Training Copyright Theft
Summary
Updated Sep 21 — Department of Justice filed a statement of interest on September 1 backing the AI fair-use claim, citing national security risks of falling behind foreign adversaries.
- • Unsealed docs show OpenAI's ChatGPT head warned AI poses 'existential threat' to publishers
- • Microsoft scientist called AI scraping 'the largest theft of labor in human history'
- • Greg Brockman was 'motivated by the gazillions' from models trained on copyrighted content
- • Filings also reference paywall circumvention and a 'doom loop' destroying web traffic
Updates
DoJ filed statement of interest backing AI fair-use claim on national security grounds
On September 1, the Department of Justice filed a statement of interest asking the court to rule that training AI on copyrighted work constitutes fair use, citing national security — arguing that restricting U.S. AI systems while foreign adversaries train on any available content risks ceding an insurmountable lead.
Brockman allegedly replied 'ah nice' to news of a paywall hack
Unsealed filings allege Greg Brockman replied 'ah nice' when informed that an employee had found a method to circumvent the New York Times' paywall — a detail that directly implicates him in knowledge of and indifference toward the circumvention.
Details
Court filings unsealed September 17, 2026
Documents were unsealed as part of the ongoing NYT v. OpenAI and Microsoft copyright infringement lawsuit. They were submitted by the NYT as part of arguments on fair use and substitutive harm.
Nick Turley: publishers face an 'existential threat' from AI
OpenAI's head of ChatGPT Nick Turley wrote internally that AI products 'are largely substitutive, period [and] will get more and more substitutive as they get better,' directly addressing the substitution harm claim.
Microsoft exec: AI training is 'largest theft of labor in human history'
Microsoft Director of Applied Science Brent Hecht described the companies' AI training practices as 'an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions' and potentially 'the largest theft of labor in human history.'
Brockman described as 'motivated by the gazillions' from copyrighted training data
OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman was described in filings as 'deeply motivated by the gazillions' he hoped to gain from commercializing AI models trained on copyrighted publisher content.
Filings reference paywall circumvention and a 'doom loop'
Internal documents include discussions of circumventing paywalls and warn of a 'doom loop' in which AI products harm web traffic and content creation—directly relevant to the NYT's substitutive harm arguments.
Documents compiled via Grok live web research
Details compiled via Grok live web research drawing on Financial Times, TechCrunch, Ars Technica, Reuters, TheWrap, and 404 Media coverage published September 17, 2026.
Legal filings and executive statements from the NYT v. OpenAI and Microsoft copyright lawsuit, unsealed September 17, 2026.
What This Means
These unsealed internal communications are potentially case-defining evidence in NYT v. OpenAI, showing senior executives privately recognized the copyright implications of their AI training practices while publicly defending them as fair use. The admissions—particularly on news substitution, paywall circumvention, and the 'doom loop'—directly address the core legal questions at trial. If the case proceeds, these statements could severely damage OpenAI and Microsoft's fair-use defense and accelerate settlement pressure. Beyond this lawsuit, the disclosures may embolden other news publishers pursuing similar copyright claims against AI companies.
Sentiment
Mostly critical of OpenAI, with emphasis on damaging internal admissions of theft
“new unredacted filings in the publishers (including my employer) vs OpenAI and Microsoft lawsuit. Microsoft's Director of applied science calls LLM training 'an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions'”
“woah. Court just unsealed Summary Judgment motions in New York Times v OpenAI / Microsoft. Easy to see why the AI companies had so many redactions (pink). Their own people wrote the lede for NYT, the 'largest theft of labor in human history'...”
“A very important 🧵 on the unsealed court filings in NY Times v. OpenAI that confirm deliberate hacking, scrapping, copying, and celebrated evasion of NY Times copyright controls (e.g, paywall) in OpenAI's collection of NY Times articles for use in ChatGPT. In sum, piracy.”
“OpenAI staff saw it coming. NYT lawsuit claims they knew AI was an 'existential threat' to publishers — and kept training on copyrighted news anyway. Lawyers: Greg Brockman was 'motivated by the gazillions.'”
Split
~90/10 critical of OpenAI vs. minimal defense of fair use in found posts.
Sources
- Microsoft exec called AI scraping ‘the largest theft of labor in human history,’ new unredacted filings revealTechCrunch
- Microsoft exec called AI scraping the “largest theft of labor in human history”Ars Technica
- OpenAI staff knew the ‘existential threat’ AI posed to publishers, New York Times claims - ft.comFt
- NYT court filing: ChatGPT's head wrote that publishers face an "existential threat" and a Microsoft executive called AI training "an astonishing theft"Ft
- OpenAI, Microsoft executives' quotes on AI training threaten copyright defenseReuters
- OpenAI and Microsoft knew they were starting a ‘doom loop’ for the webThe Verge
- Microsoft director: AI scraping 'the largest theft of labor in human history'Tomshardware
- Historic lawsuit sparks flurry of option activity in this stockCNBC
- OpenAI Feared "Optics" of what might appear on Hacker NewsAuthorsguild
- Publishers finally have AI buyers for their content yet zero say in the priceFastcompany
- Microsoft knows it robbed publishers to train AI. It just doesn’t careComputerworld