In K-12, there is a strong awareness of US copyright laws. Since the beginning of time, schools have had to manage copyright. This continued from the print media into computer software and then online content.
AI has dramatically changed the way we discuss copyright.
The reason is that, for many AI platforms, there is a fundamental question about where they got their information.
I am not a lawyer, and this isn't legal advice, but my understanding is that an AI platform is not legally allowed to consume copyrighted information as it builds its knowledge base without the permission of the copyright holder. That is no different than in the other media.
There have been numerous accusations and lawsuits about copyright violations.
A certain major AI vendor just agreed to a record payment to settle copyright lawsuits.
There is a question as to whether you and a consumer of AI are also liable, perhaps unknowingly, for using inappropriately obtained copyrighted materials? One AI vendor offered to protect users of its AI platform from any lawsuits arising from copyright violations.
Just like ROBOTS.TXT, there are ways to tell AI web crawlers not to scan all or parts of your site. However, there have been numerous accusations that AI tools are not respecting the site's stated AI web crawl policy.
One major AI vendor that has been in the news a lot has been directly accused of knowingly ignoring AI web crawling requests. This vendor was charged with faking browser connections and screen scraping to extract information they were asked not to consume. It has gotten so bad that Cloudflare has made it its mission to block this vendor. It is a game of whack-a-mole, trying to keep them in line with the rules.
A court recently ruled that if an AI company purchases copyrighted material, it can be used just as if it were a book, for example, to read and use the information.
It is crazy right now.
Your librarians have pounded this in our heads forever. You've had to deal with this for software licensing. This is more of the same, but much less transparent than you counting software licenses and how many devices have it installed.
As you discuss AI solutions, you need to ask any potential AI provider how your use of their platform lines up with copyright laws.
Scott F. Quimby
Senior Technical Advisor, CISSP, vCISO
Acture Solutions, Inc.
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