Australia's ABC rejects AI copyright carveout, believes already been scraped

SYDNEY, Oct 6 : The Australian national broadcaster rejected a suggestion on Tuesday that it was too hard for AI companies to strike licencing deals to access its content and said the tech giants had probably already "scraped" its output for model training.

After ChatGPT maker OpenAI and Claude maker Anthropic called for relaxing of Australian copyright laws to let them access domestically produced content, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) said the current laws were fit for purpose.

"The copyright system is completely adequate to manage the business of AI," ABC head of content and legal operations Kate Gilchrist told a parliamentary inquiry into AI.

"AI can engage in negotiations with rightsholders for the relevant licences that they need," she said.

Media reports have said the Australian government was considering an "opt out" clause for AI companies, effectively giving the AI companies access to content unless a rightsholder objects, but that "places the burden on rightsholders", said Gilchrist.

"We cannot scour the internet and ensure that we are opting out on all those sites. It simply does not work," she said.

When asked if the ABC believed AI companies had used its content without paying for it, Gilchrist said, "I do not think we have conclusive evidence that we have been scraped but I expect that there is a likely possibility that we have been."

Asked if the government-funded, independent broadcaster would replace newsreaders with AI-produced alternatives, ABC senior executive for policy and regulatory affairs David Sutton said the company had "no plan to replace humans".

"I can envisage particular contexts in programme making where that might be necessary. But fundamentally, there's no plan to recreate our newsreaders or anything like that," he said.

The Joint Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence is one of at least four Australian state and federal inquiries into the technology.

Representatives of OpenAI and Anthropic are scheduled to appear at the same inquiry later on Tuesday.