Issues and Selected Commentary Regarding Generative AI

Government of Canada

What We Heard Report: Consultation on Copyright in the Age of Generative Artificial Intelligence

In late 2023, the Federal Government conducted a "Consultation on Copyright in the Age of Generative Artificial Intelligence". This report summarizes the feedback received during the consultation.

Issues of concern covered in the report include text and data mining (TDM); authorship and ownership of works generated by AI; infringement and liability regarding AI; and, engagement with Indigenous people. 

Commentary

ABLawg.ca (12 May 2025)
The OpenAI Copyright Lawsuit: Could It Backfire on Canadian Media?

This blog post comments on a lawsuit filed against OpenAI by a group of a group of Canadian news media companies. 

A key legal issue in this case is whether training AI models on copyrighted news content qualifies as “reproduction” under the Copyright Act. Section 3(1) of the Copyright Act gives copyright holders the exclusive right to reproduce their works or any substantial part of them. The Plaintiffs argue that OpenAI’s models copied and reproduced their content without authorization, which would violate these rights (Statement of Claim at paras 52–54). (para. 3) 

Barry Sookman website
Barry Sookman is a technology, copyright, privacy, and AI lawyer. See this website for timely posts on issues related to copyright and artificial intelligence. 

Court Filings

Ontario Superior Court of Justice
Statement of Claim: Toronto Star Newspapers et al v. OpenAI

In this claim, filed in November 2024, one of the issues alleged by the plaintiffs is that their content was copied without authorization and used to train AI models, and that this is copyright infringement.

Supreme Court of British Columbia
Notice of Civil Claim: CanLII v. Caseway AI

In this claim, filed in November 2024, the plaintiffs allege breach of contract and copyright infringement for the bulk downloading of materials from their website, which is in violation of their terms of use.

Commentary

CIPPIC
CIPPIC v. Sahni: AI's Role in Copyright Law

In this article, CIPPIC describes their application filed in the Federal Court "to expunge or rectify a copyright registration that holds out an artificial intelligence (“AI”) program as an author under Canadian copyright law".