CNN sues Perplexity for scraping articles and reproducing verbatim

CNN filed a lawsuit against Perplexity in New York federal court on Thursday, alleging that the AI search startup scrapes its content without permission and produces “verbatim” copies of its articles. The lawsuit claims that Perplexity’s AI tools, including its “answer” engine and Comet browser, bypass CNN’s paywall and technical protections by using unidentified crawlers. In one example, a user prompt with just the article title reportedly returned substantial verbatim excerpts from CNN’s original work, “What’s next for Minneapolis? A shaky promise, mounting tensions and the fight for control.” CNN states that Perplexity’s actions devalue human reporting and violate copyright laws.

The lawsuit adds to a growing legal battle against Perplexity, which is already being sued by The New York Times, Encyclopedia Britannica, Merriam-Webster, News Corp (parent of The Wall Street Journal), Amazon, and Reddit. CNN had previously discussed a licensing deal in October 2025, where Perplexity’s Comet Plus subscription would include CNN content, but the agreement fell apart in November 2025 due to disagreements over usage limits. CNN then demanded Perplexity stop using its content, but received no response. CNN is now seeking damages and a permanent injunction. Perplexity’s spokesperson Jesse Dwyer responded, “You can’t copyright facts,” signaling the company’s defense that its tools merely summarize factual information.