Nov 2 (Reuters) - A group of newspapers, including the New York Times (NYT.N), opens new tab and the New York Daily ​News, sued internet company Brave Software in Manhattan federal court ‌on Monday for allegedly scraping their articles for AI training and unlawfully enabling users of its web browser to circumvent their paywalls.

The newspapers said in the complaints, opens new tab ​that Brave illegally sells their content to AI companies including ​Anthropic, Perplexity and xAI — which are not defendants in the ⁠cases — in addition to infringing their copyrights by allowing users to ​access their articles for free

"The New York Times is overpaying its ​attorneys and underpaying its journalists. (Who could've easily identified the disinformation in this suit.)," a Perplexity spokesperson said in response

Spokespeople for Brave, Anthropic and xAI did not immediately ​respond to requests for comment on the complaints

"While we believe in ​the ethical and responsible use and development of AI, Brave has flouted established copyright ‌law ⁠and ignored repeated requests by The Times to stop its infringing conduct," New York Times spokesperson Graham James said in a statement

The news outlets have separately sued OpenAI in a potential landmark case over its AI ​training

The outlets' lawsuits ​filed on ⁠Monday said that Brave "acts both like a burglar that misappropriates the content of publishers, and an AI 'fence' that ​sells stolen content to third parties"

The cases are ​New York ⁠Times Co v. Brave Software Inc, US District Court for the Southern District of New York, No. 1:26-cv-09549 and Daily News LP v. Brave ⁠Software ​Inc, US District Court for the Southern ​District of New York, No. 1:26-cv-09554