USA Today Co. sues OpenAI for $250 million-plus over ChatGPT

What happened: USA Today Co. and 13 affiliated companies sued seven OpenAI entities in the Southern District of New York. The complaint is dated 8 October 2026 and was reported on 12 October by Law Commentary.

The details: The 79-page complaint covers 19 newspapers, including The Arizona Republic, Detroit Free Press, The Tennessean, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Indianapolis Star. It alleges OpenAI copied hundreds of thousands of news articles without permission to train its models, and that ChatGPT reproduces their reporting.

It also brings a DMCA claim. The publishers say OpenAI stripped author names, titles and other ownership information from the articles.

The numbers: The complaint cites more than 160,000 entries from the papers' sites in OpenAI's WebText dataset. About 83,300 of them are tied to USA Today's website. Its examples use GPT-5.6.

The publishers seek more than $250 million, profits attributable to the copying, attorneys' fees and a jury trial.

The catch for OpenAI: The publishers also want an injunction. They ask the court to order destruction of GPT and other models and training datasets containing their material, under Section 503(b) of the Copyright Act.

Why it matters: The publishers argue ChatGPT's commercial use and its potential to substitute for news content undermine a fair-use defence. They say it could cut traffic and subscription, advertising and licensing revenue.

The context: OpenAI has defended similar suits on fair-use grounds. The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in December 2023 over similar claims.

What's next: The plaintiffs asked the court to treat the case as related to the consolidated OpenAI copyright litigation. The report did not include an OpenAI response, and it did not link the filing.