Japan’s top newspaper association demands AI firms seek consent before training on news content, warning that unauthorized use may breach copyright law.
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| AI firms must obtain permission before using news content for training, says Japan's top press group, citing copyright law and threats to journalistic integrity. Image: CH |
TOKYO, Japan — June 6, 2025:
Japan’s leading press association has issued a stern warning to generative AI companies, urging them to obtain explicit permission before using news content for model training. The Japan Newspaper Publishers and Editors Association stated that such unauthorized data scraping could violate copyright law and undermine the sustainability of journalism.
In its statement released Wednesday, the association called on both AI service providers and the Japanese government to take concrete steps to protect news content from unapproved exploitation. It emphasized that many member news outlets have adopted technical safeguards to block AI crawlers, only to find these measures ignored by some developers.
According to the association, the unauthorized use of news materials by generative AI systems "could amount to copyright infringement" under Japanese law—particularly if it "unreasonably prejudices the interests of the copyright owner." This call for accountability reflects growing global tension between media organizations and AI developers over how human-created content is harvested and repurposed.
The statement also addressed the increasing impact of "zero-click searches," where AI-generated summaries and search snippets provide users with direct answers, reducing traffic to original news sources. The association described this trend as “free riding” that threatens the core economic model of journalism.
“If the role of news organizations, which are vital to public information, continues to erode, the people’s right to know will be jeopardized,” the statement warned. It called for a regulatory overhaul, urging authorities to go beyond existing legal frameworks to address the evolving challenges presented by generative AI.
This latest development adds Japan to a growing list of countries where media groups are pushing back against what they see as unchecked AI-driven content extraction. Similar copyright battles are emerging in Europe and North America, as publishers demand transparency, compensation, and protection of intellectual property in the age of artificial intelligence.