AI companies are running out of free content
Reddit is suing Perplexity AI and three data-scraping companies, SerpApi, Oxylabs, and AWMProxy, claiming they illegally collected Reddit data to power AI tools.
Reddit compared their actions to “breaking into an armoured truck when you can’t get into the vault,” accusing them of bypassing data protections to help Perplexity’s “answer engine.”
The company said it sent Perplexity a cease-and-desist letter in May 2024, but the number of Reddit links on Perplexity went up soon after.
Reddit also claims Perplexity accessed posts meant only for Google, suggesting it scraped search results to find Reddit content.
Reddit has already licensed its data to companies like OpenAI and Google and previously sued Anthropic for similar reasons.
Its legal chief, Ben Lee, said AI companies are in a “race” to get human-written content, fuelling what he called a “data laundering economy.”
To sum it up:
Reddit says Perplexity and others stole content to power AI.
Perplexity denies it and calls Reddit’s approach unfair.
Oxylabs says it collects only public data and will fight the case.
Reddit’s not playing free anymore
Perplexity said it hasn’t received the lawsuit yet but denies using Reddit data or training AI models on it, calling Reddit’s demands “strong-arm tactics.”
Oxylabs also denied the claims, saying it only helps others access public data legally and that Reddit may just want to resell the same data for more money.
Reddit wants that bag… - MV