Lawsuit against GitHub Copilot: court narrowed but not dismissed copyright infringement case
GitHub
In a copyright infringement lawsuit against GitHub, Microsoft and OpenAI over the use of unlicensed code in the Copilot tool, the court dismissed only some of the claims, leaving the possibility of damages for some plaintiffs.
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According to a ruling by Northern California District Judge Jon S. Tigar, the defendants' motions to dismiss are granted in part. The claims of two developer plaintiffs are dismissed in their entirety, while the claims of three others for damages will be considered.
In doing so, the court agreed to dismiss a number of claims under California law, finding that they overlap with federal copyright law. Also dismissed were some claims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for lack of exact match of copied code.
However, key allegations of infringement of open source licences by the defendants, as well as GitHub's terms of service, have not yet been addressed. Thus, the plaintiffs still have an opportunity to recover compensation.
GitHub and Microsoft representatives expressed confidence in the legality of Copilot's work.
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Source: The Register
