Google's AI global copyright infringements at scale needs to stop

[Whitey]

Thanks @goodoldweb. This is one of the most important and grounded posts I've seen in recent months, so i extracted it from the thread and started an OP:

Webmasters, it’s time to face the truth: no one is going to protect our content from Google’s AI Overviews—except us. Every day, original work is being lifted, repackaged, and served back to users with no or very little attribution, and no traffic returned. This isn’t curation. It’s exploitation.

Every one of us, in our own countries, has copyright laws that protect our work. We don’t need to wait for a global solution—each of us can push back, starting at home.

So let’s stop waiting. Each of us has the power to act within our own legal systems. File complaints. Demand accountability. Push your local authorities and copyright bodies to take this seriously. Almost every country has a copyright authority with a website and a complaint form—start there. The more of us submit complaints, the harder it is for them to ignore. Google isn’t above the law—and it’s time we remind them of that.

I understand some webmasters fear filing takedown requests might risk their sites being de-indexed by Google, but staying silent only lets the problem grow. When filing complaints with authorities, it’s important to mention this fear—so they understand the full impact on webmasters and can take it seriously.

And just as important—we must all demand real tools to block AI from scraping our content. This shouldn’t be opt-out. It should be opt-in. Our work should not be fair game just because it’s online. Consent must be the default.

Do not delay. Do not wait for someone else to lead. Every day we stay silent, more of our work is taken without credit, without permission. If we don’t act now, we’re handing over our rights without a fight.

In Australia, our copyright law includes ‘fair dealing’ exceptions—but they’re limited to specific uses like research, criticism, or news reporting. Simply scraping or repurposing our content without permission doesn’t qualify. That means we have strong legal protections—if we choose to use them.

Today, we filed an official complaint with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), and also with the Australian Copyright Council, to hold Google accountable—and I encourage you to take action in your own countries too.

P.S. I wish this website would take a more prominent role. It is a gathering place for webmasters from all over the world and, in a way, represents webmasters everywhere.

What’s playing out isn’t just a technical shift, it’s a structural one. The long-standing "value exchange" between content creators and platforms is eroding. AI Overviews increasingly reframe your original work into zero-click summaries, often without attribution, credit, or meaningful visibility in return. It's hard to see that as anything other than extractive.

In the Australian context, as mentioned, 'fair dealing' has well-defined limits, and broad repurposing for commercial advantage doesn’t comfortably sit within those. The underlying legal frameworks do exist in most jurisdictions, though they’re not always visible or enforced in the context of AI scraping and synthesis.

What’s also becoming clear is that the web’s feedback loop (user visits, engagement signals, backlinks) are being bypassed. As a result, traditional SEO strategies are starting to decouple from visibility outcomes. It raises a difficult but important question for many site owners: where is the line between exposure and exploitation?

Whether or not one pursues formal action, understanding the boundaries of copyright, fair use/fair dealing, and digital property rights seems more relevant now than ever. It’s no longer just about rankings, it’s about how the web sustains original creators.

A tactic that makes actionable notice more likely is to file complaints and cc your local politicians, authorities, ombudsmen, key journalists in your jurisdiction. Almost like an "Open Letter" that hit's the mark. The aggregated effort cannot be ignored by making those accountable to each other in the cc'd correspondence.

I'll be following up on this over the next few days.

[EditorialGuy]

There’s no cavalry coming. The future is in owning relationships directly with email, apps, social, even paid or walled communities etc etc. Playing the Google game passively and waiting for roll back to the past is no longer a strategy. It’s surrender.

I think you're being a little too quick in writing off the World Wide Web. The more Google turns its back on the open Web, the greater the opportunity for a search engine (as opposed to an "answer engine") that fills the niche that Google leaves behind.

[tangor]

Google turns its back on the open Web, the greater the opportunity for a search engine (as opposed to an "answer engine") that fills the niche that Google leaves behind.

One that includes the same ad revenue etc?

If AI doesn't "work" for g they will go back to being a search engine in a heartbeat, make no mistake.

What WILL not change is the current pennies on $ promises of the elder web after everyone was hooked.

We don't need yet another search engine, which further dilutes the search sector, What we REALLY need is durable copyright and CONTROL OF SAME. Without that there is no way forward. One aspect of copyright law is that the copyright holder has to make all effort to protect their own IP (intellectual property). At present I can't see individual creators having pockets deep enough to sue the various AI infringers who, unfortunately, have pockets filled with investor cash deep enough to bury the Himalayas...

Not doom and gloom, just common sense.

[Kendo]

I remember a time when the earth was still green and search engines were transparent. In those days software makers promoted their wares by getting reviewed by reputable software download sites. For example Tucows was top tier because they vetted, reviewed and rated submissions. Only the best software in each category was approved so getting listed on Tucows was a huge plus to us software developers.

There were other shareware sites almost as reputable. In all there used to be more than 300 shareware sites that were approved by the software developers association that most of us belonged to. It was that association that developed the PAD file system for standardising the information that was submitted to shareware sites.

Most of those shareware sites would have been paying their bills by displaying ads, like many of the members here.

But thanks to search engines and their numb-brained insistence that such sites have no importance to rankings, the software industry has been screwed. Tucows has gone. The Association of Shareware Professionals has gone. So too have most of those shareware sites and the PAD file system is now is now useless.

The rot began a long time before AI reared its head.

[Whitey]

Interesting reflections all around.

@EditorialGuy You’re spot on that waiting for Google to change course is no longer a viable strategy. Owning the relationship; through email, apps, communities; this is where resilience lies. And yet, I also think your optimism about a return to a more open Web shouldn’t be underestimated. If users begin to feel like they’re being force-fed AI answers or locked into homogenized platforms, the appetite for real discovery and diversity may well spark a shift.

@tangor I think you’re absolutely right: Google will do whatever serves their bottom line. If AI loses its edge or ROI, they’ll pivot fast. But your point about copyright is arguably the bigger, longer-term battleground. Without enforceable rights and access to recourse, smaller creators, whether writers, musicians, or indie devs, will continue to be steamrolled. The current system rewards scale, not originality.

@Kendo That’s a sobering and valuable historical perspective. Tucows was iconic, a real example of human curation and trust-based ranking that’s sorely lacking now. PAD files and vetted shareware submissions gave legitimacy to indie developers. The collapse of those ecosystems really was a canary in the coal mine. AI may just be the latest phase in a longer unraveling of decentralised value on the Web.

Maybe what we need isn’t just a new search engine, but an entire ecosystem reset, one that rewards trust, ownership, and curation over sheer volume and data extraction.

Curious to know, do any of you see emerging spaces or platforms that hint at such a shift? Or is it still too early?

Would you like to continue this tone, or add a more provocative or humorous angle?

[tangor]

Would you like to continue this tone, or add a more provocative or humorous angle?

Provocative might upset the mods. Humor is where you find it. Humor, in fact, is everywhere. We all remember the age old commentary:

"Human Comedy"

---wherein one can chose to find the funny, or the shocking, insane, fallible, clay-foot, glorious, marginal, (hold on a minute, need to find my book of adjectives)---

COPYRIGHT PROTECTION FIRST, everything else is just a who you want to do business with proposition.

AI scrapes at scale, relentlessly, then massages what is collected until it is better spun than old time word spinner hacks of old. Auto-magically, coldly, routinely. The chaos ongoing can only be addressed at nation/state legislative levels (top/down) and not from the roots (bottom/up). None of the individual creators---and all webmasters are individual creators regardless of what has been scraped or co-opted to make a website---recognize that SOME are actual original creators/writers/artists/performers/musicians/etc

Getting government involved to ENFORCE enacted copyright laws is the big step. Getting a voice to be heard alludes to some kind of organization---BUT THAT IS NOT SOMETHING THAT CAN BE DONE ON WEBMASTER WORLD. WW is a web/tech self-help educational forum and not a political action forum.

READ the TOS

[helleborine]

The content pilfering started with Pinterest. I'll always wonder, had we stopped it at the time, if things would have degenerated to this point.

Content creation used to be about serious knowledge and sharing resources; it's now diminished to 10-minute "box opening" youtube videos and dance shorts.

[Whitey]

Here’s a copy of my letter circulated to key journalists, politicians and leaders in compliance authorities in US, UK, EU and AU making them accountable to each other.

FWIW

Government Response to My Letter on AI & Digital Platforms

I received a formal reply from the Australian Government regarding my concerns about AI, copyright, and the dominance of digital platforms.

Key takeaways from the letter (29 July 2025):

* They are relying on a **patchwork of existing laws** (privacy, IP, consumer protection, competition, online safety, etc.) rather than introducing bespoke AI legislation.

* Copyright & AI issues have been handed to the Attorney General’s Department via a “Copyright and AI Reference Group.” No binding policy yet, just ongoing stakeholder consultation.

* The ACCC inquiry (2020–25) into digital platforms (search/ads) found anti‑competitive conduct. The government agreed to a new regulatory regime and held consultations (Dec 2024 – Feb 2025), but as of July 2025 it is still “considering feedback.”

* Tone of the reply: emphasis on "capturing the opportunity of AI while building trust," which reads as more about balancing innovation with public confidence than enforcing accountability in the short term.

My read:

It’s an acknowledgement without action. Copyright and competition concerns are recognised, but real policy is still in the slow lane. For webmasters, that means we’re left dealing with platform dominance and AI disruption ourselves while government regulation inches along.

Here's the letter with a few redactions for privacy purposes:

Dear Mr [-]

Thank you for your email of 22 May 2025, to the Hon Michelle Rowland MP which has been
referred to Senator the Hon Tim Ayres, regarding your concerns about artificial intelligence (AI)
and its implications for the global creative economy. The Minister has asked me to respond on
his behalf.

The Albanese Government is focused on capturing the opportunity of AI and building trust and
confidence in its use. Australia has a range of laws that regulate AI. These include economy-
wide laws on privacy, administrative law, online safety, corporations’ law, intellectual property,
competition and consumer protection, and anti-discrimination. In considering its approach to AI
regulation, the Government is focused on getting the balance right so we can capture the
opportunity of AI while building trust and confidence.

Intersections between AI and copyright fall within the responsibilities of the Attorney-General,
the Hon Michelle Rowland MP, and the Attorney-General’s Department. One way in which
these have been explored to date is the Copyright and AI Reference Group, established by the
former Attorney-General as a mechanism for engagement with stakeholders to inform potential
policy responses to AI and copyright issues. You can find more information at
[ag.gov.au...]

As you might be aware, between 2020-25 the ACCC conducted an inquiry into digital platform
services, including online search and digital advertising, and has recommended a new regulatory
regime to address concerns with anti-competitive conduct by digital platforms. The Government
agreed to implement a new regime and has consulted on a proposed framework between
December 2024 - February 2025. It is currently considering the feedback received in
consultation.

Thank you for writing on this matter.

Yours sincerely

Niki Strachan

Acting General Manager, AI Governance Branch
Technology and Digital Division

29 July 2025

If you follow the reference link you'll notice that the likes of Canva and Google are participating in consultation, as you'd expect.

In my view, as has been mentioned earlier by others, the needle of change will only move if the big players rattle the cages. We're in unchartered waters, so i don't expect anything soon..... like maybe a decade, by which time the World will have moved on.

[Whitey]

A productivity commission report has been released here and Australia is moving toward a TDM exception under fair dealing, similar in spirit to EU/UK regimes; but facing strong creator pushback. Major AI developers (Google, OpenAI etc.) would stand to benefit, provided transparency and opt out systems are robust. Enforcement would likely rely on licensing collectives, regulatory oversight, transparency duties and potential court actions, not wholesale new AI laws.

Nothing's been fully decided yet, suffice to saying that Government's Treasurer was on prime time national TV tonight saying that strong copywrite law exists to protect creators.

The current U.S. position is that there is no new specific copyright law. AI generated works are not protected unless they show meaningful human authorship, and use of copyrighted material for training is assessed case by case under the existing fair use doctrine.

It doesn't look like small publishers are going to get much protection, unless they form collectives, which in many cases, imo, is impractical.
[theconversation.com...]

[ichthyous]

The current U.S. position is that there is no new specific copyright law. AI generated works are not protected unless they show meaningful human authorship, and use of copyrighted material for training is assessed case by case under the existing fair use doctrine

As for the USCO position, they are making space for creatives to use AI as part of the creative process, but I can tell you that they have zero ability to accurately determine what works are AI generated, how much of the composition was dependent on AI etc.

I registered some of my work and the USCO declined to register the work because they believed it was all AI gen. In fact, none of it was...zero % AI content. I had to prove that to them before they would grant the registration. There isn't enough staff, they aren't able to discern it on their own, and what is there is currently being undermined by the Trump administration.

The sheer bribery of the administration and our members of Congress by the leading tech giants, means that copyright concerns and the plight of the individual creator will absolutely take a back seat to making these AI platform investors even more fabulously wealthy than they already are. And don't look to the Supreme Court to back up creative rights...the conservative majority on the court won't, they will take a wrecking ball to anything impeding their wealthy patrons/owners...that has been shown time and time again.

[Kendo]

I am not surprised. I keep finding articles written about "copy protection" authored by university professors that read like they were researched from the first page of search results only. Even wikipedia's page on the topic, where we use to feature as the #1 reference, has been inundated by 100s of more recently written references. The termites in my industry have since removed our reference.

[Kendo]

[londondaily.news ]

[maccas]

How does this end? I mean why are people going to bother making content sites if they get no traffic? What happens when people stop publishing information because people are going straight to AI? Wont it just become stale?

[Whitey]

@maccas - You’re right to ask that, we’re already seeing the risks play out.

In Australia (Aug 21) the ACTU (Australian Council Of Trade Unions) claimed a breakthrough on AI training, but the ASA (Australian Society of Authors) and ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) rejected it as a sell-out, while Peter Garrett (front man of Midnight Oil) branded it cultural “road kill.”

In the U.S. (Aug 21), a judge let News Corp’s copyright case against Perplexity proceed, yet only weeks earlier courts gave Meta and Anthropic “fair use” wins.

The EU (July) is now pushing to scrap “opt-out” and force explicit consent, Hollywood (June) is suing Midjourney, and just this week (Aug 24) Pulitzer cartoonist Jack Ohman (Cartoonist) warned AI is “making a mockery of my profession.”

The pattern is clear: unless enforceable frameworks emerge, creators will walk away, and what’s left online will be stale machine output.

[Whitey]

This Anthropic settlement highlights AI copyright risks for Google AI Overviews.

In a surprise settlement with U.S. authors over pirated book training data, there is a sharpening of the spotlight on AI copyright risks. A judge ruled that training on purchased books was fair use, but building a “library” of pirated texts was not, this leaving Anthropic exposed to massive damages before it chose to settle.

The case echoes concerns around Google’s AI Overviews. Many more cases to be heard, including, like this one, class actions, which I suppose could be quite huge.
[reuters.com...]

[tangor]

This will be an unpopular viewpoint. Just saying that up front.

There ain't all that new under the sun content. The web itself is a conglomerate of scraped, stolen, infringed, converted content. Won't believe you if you say different. What LITTLE that qualifies as "new" is immediately seized by bad actors (and good actors, too!) which dilutes the submission almost overnight. THE REST OF THE WEB is actually protected by copyright for Mainstream, Brand, Corporate, Government, Entertainment and few of those are actually fighting against AI overreach. Why? Vested interests. Nation/States. Money. Power. Control. Oh, My!

All this means that finding a sympathetic ear for the plight of "ordinary webmaster/creators" is between Zero and Nul. The struggling mass COULD rise up like a tidal wave and end up as a minor disturbance 6,000 miles away. Grand Panic and Anxiety, with little to show. Organizing is expensive and requires DEDICATION---and both are in short supply. Those with money won't be spending it tilting at windmills and those SEEKING money have no time for high ideals and rule of law.

Simply offered as an explanation why some of these commentaries seem to fall on deaf ears and go nowhere. THIS is the real world. AI, at this time in human history, is supported by GOVERNMENTS and I will leave you with the most dangerous words in the world:

"I'm from the government and here to help you."

[Whitey]

@tangor – You’re right that scraping isn’t new, but for web publishers the difference is stark. In the past, snippets and aggregation pointed users back to source sites; traffic and ad value still flowed.

With AI, whole answers are generated and consumed in-line. That cuts publishers out entirely, which is why the stakes feel existential.

In the EU especially, web publishers are being grouped alongside authors, musicians and film makers. Collectives and licensing regimes are already in motion, and Brussels is signalling a push for explicit consent rather than “train now, opt-out later.”

So while the US may default to fair use, I suspect Europe (and maybe Australia) won’t let the publishing ecosystem be hollowed out without a fight. There’s too much at stake.

[tangor]

suspect Europe (and maybe Australia) won’t let the publishing ecosystem be hollowed out without a fight.

I sincerely hope so! Just going by historical evidence---it is wait and see.