A committee of UK legislators has criticized the UK government for what it sees as a passive approach to copyright infringements as a result of large language models (LLMs).
In a letter addressed to Science and Technology Minister Michelle Donelan, the House of Lords Select Committee on Communications and Digital criticized the government’s handling of copyright issues, claiming that its limited actions effectively see the government endorsing copyright infringements.
The news comes just several months after the country hosted a worldwide AI summit during which 28 countries signed the Bletchley Agreement to develop safe and responsible AI.
UK government isn’t doing enough to protect from AI copyright issues
Since the public preview launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, and the hundreds of subsequent launches of other similar generative AI tools, concerns have been raised around the use of copyrighted material, including text, images and audio data, in the development of the models.
The committee’s letter reads: “The Government’s reticence to take meaningful action amounts to a de facto endorsement of tech firms’ practices.”
The letter contrasts the government’s approach to copyright enforcement (“a failed series of roundtables”) with the high-profile attention and significant funding allocated to AI safety initiatives, such as the recently revealed £400 million in funding for a new AI Safety Institute.
An earlier report also saw the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee slate the UK government for failing to sufficiently protect the creative industry from copyright infringements.
This isn’t the first time that generative AI has come under fire for copyright issues – early on in Microsoft and OpenAI’s collaboration, GitHub (owned by Microsoft, and using OpenAI LLMs) was sued over a lack of attribution.
In September 2023, nearly a year after the public had got their hands on generative AI on a wide scale, Microsoft proclaimed that it would defend its Copilot users from copyright infringement lawsuits, suggesting a high degree of certainty around responsible AI.
OpenAI followed suit in November 2023.
As the debate over copyright and AI continues, it’s clear that a balance between technological innovation and the protection of IP rights deserves more attention.
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