New York Times, Others Sue Brave Over AI Content Scraping

WHO:

TechCrunch - The New York Times is suing Brave, the company behind the privacy-focused Brave web browser.

The Verge - The New York Daily News, the Chicago Tribune, and the Orlando Sentinel filed a lawsuit against Brave Software.

The Verge - The publications’ attorney, Steven Lieberman, said Brave should be held responsible for distributing publishers’ reporting to AI companies.

The Verge - Graham James, an NYT spokesperson, said the lawsuit seeks to hold Brave accountable. Jesse Dwyer, Perplexity’s chief communications officer, criticized the NYT and its lawsuit.

The Verge - Anthropic, Perplexity, Mistral, xAI, and Cohere were named as AI companies allegedly given copyrighted content. Brave, Anthropic, Mistral, SpaceXSI, and Cohere had not immediately replied to a request for comment.

WHAT:

TechCrunch - The NYT is suing Brave over alleged scraping and unlawful distribution of the outlet’s copyrighted material to customers including Anthropic and Perplexity.

The Verge - The publications allege Brave monetized its index of scraped websites by giving AI companies paid access to “real-time online content from the Brave Index.” They say companies use the index to train models, answer user queries, or both.

The Verge - The complaint alleges Brave supplied “stolen copyrighted content” to “many” AI companies and promotes “hundreds of top publishers” as available through its browser’s “Paywall blocker.”

Ars Technica - The NYT is demanding that Brave shut down its paywall blocker and end its deals with AI firms; the lawsuit calls Brave a “supplier, dealer, and distributor” of stolen news content.

The Verge - The complaint says Brave never obtained publishers’ permission, compensated them, or stopped users from bypassing their paywalls, and took steps to prevent publishers from blocking its access to their websites.

WHY:

The Verge - James said the NYT filed because Brave allegedly ignored repeated requests to stop infringing conduct, adding that it believes in the “ethical and responsible use and development of AI.”

The Verge - Lieberman said AI companies were using Brave as a route to journalism they had no right to obtain, and that buying allegedly stolen content secondhand does not make it legitimate.

HOW:

The Verge - The alleged conduct involved scraping websites, indexing their content, providing AI companies paid access to the index, and enabling users to bypass publisher paywalls.

The Verge - The article clarified that the lawsuit was filed by the three publications, not the companies that operate them.

(UPDATED November 3, 2026 20:02 UTC)

The New York Times and three other newspapers are suing Brave over alleged copyright infringement. They accuse Brave of scraping journalism, selling AI firms access, and helping users bypass paywalls. The lawsuit seeks to stop the alleged conduct and end Brave’s deals with AI companies.