Big Tech's AI Copyright Woes Spur New Wave of Shareholder Suits

Shareholders are suing Microsoft and Adobe for allegedly concealing unauthorised use of copyrighted material to train AI models, claiming executives breached fiduciary duties and misled investors about AI training practices. The litigation opens a new front in AI copyright disputes beyond author and publisher suits, with potential securities fraud implications. If you're building AI on scraped data without explicit licensing, your board and investors now face shareholder suits for breach of duty—not just copyright claims from authors. The legal framework is shifting from 'did you infringe' to 'did you tell shareholders you were taking that risk', and the cost of silence just jumped.