Meta Faces Legal Challenge by French Publishers Over AI Training
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French publishers and authors are suing Meta Platforms Inc. for copyright infringement, accusing the tech giant of using their books to train its generative AI.

French publishers and authors are suing Meta Platforms Inc. for copyright infringement, accusing the tech giant of using their books to train its generative artificial intelligence model without authorization.

  • banana_lama@lemm.eeEnglish
    9·
    1 day ago

    Dude you’re misunderstanding this.

    The French punishers can sue Facebook in the US for violating their copyright. But since Facebook also operates in France, they can sue them there. It’s that simple.

    Copyright law is pretty powerful and generally global. If you write a book in France in French, I can’t translate and sell it in the US.

    So the punishers can sue in the US but they’d probably not win. Facebook operating in France means it is subject to french laws and can be sued there.

    • General_Effort@lemmy.worldEnglish
      14·
      1 day ago

      I guess my post was too long. Yes, France could enforce a judgment against Meta by leaning on the French division of Meta. The question is, on what legal basis this would happen.

      They are suing because of something that happened in the US, right? What argument is there to apply French law?

      That’s not merely politically contentious. It is explicitly against internation law; treaties that France has signed.

      • biofaust@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        1 day ago

        Since Meta operates in France, it is being punished for something that happened in France. Legal representatives of the company as a whole are present in the EU. Divisions are not relevant to this discussion.

        • General_Effort@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          1 day ago

          Is the argument that something that a multinational corporation does in one country, happens in all countries where the corporation is present? There’s no way that would stand up in court.

                • General_Effort@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  12·
                  22 hours ago

                  They follow French law in France and US law in the US. How else could it work?

                  They can’t choose to apply US labor law in France. Do you think they can be made to follow French labor law in Silicon Valley?

                  • biofaust@lemmy.worldEnglish
                    11·
                    22 hours ago

                    I bring you the example of the Territorial Scope of the GDPR since it is the one I am most acquainted with:

                    • This Regulation applies to the processing of personal data in the context of the activities of an establishment of a controller or a processor in the Union, regardless of whether the processing takes place in the Union or not.

                    • This Regulation applies to the processing of personal data of data subjects who are in the Union by a controller or processor not established in the Union, where the processing activities are related to:

              the offering of goods or services, irrespective of whether a payment of the data subject is required, to such data subjects in the Union; or

              the monitoring of their behaviour as far as their behaviour takes place within the Union.

                    • This Regulation applies to the processing of personal data by a controller not established in the Union, but in a place where Member State law applies by virtue of public international law.

                    Similar articles are there for the AI Act (which got JD Vance to talk shit about the EU on the 11th February) and the Product Liability Directive.

                    This is the reality we live in. Up to you to accept it or not.

      • banana_lama@lemm.eeEnglish
        11·
        1 day ago

        Did they deploy their AI in Europe? The AI trained on stolen data? It’s like saying that you pirated a Disney movie in Europe and are selling derivative work from that in the US

        • General_Effort@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          23 hours ago

          Did they deploy their AI in Europe?

          That’s a good question. I just checked with Meta’s website. It says Meta AI is “not available” in my country, which is in the EU.