A US judge largely denies Perplexity and three data scraper firms' bid to dismiss Reddit's lawsuit over claims of copyright law violations under DMCA
On Friday, a judge largely denied a motion to dismiss from a web scraper, SerpApi, which is accused of conspiring with Perplexity AI …
Context & Ripple Effects
Reddit’s case began with its [[a:891726|2025 suit alleging that Perplexity and scraping vendors obtained Reddit material through Google results]]. The latest ruling keeps most of that dispute in court rather than resolving whether the alleged conduct violated the DMCA.
It arrives just after SerpApi won dismissal of Google’s copyright suit over plain, aggregated search results, underscoring that the legal outcome can turn on the claimed data path and statutory theory rather than scraping alone.
First-order effects
- Reddit can continue pursuing most of its DMCA claims against Perplexity, SerpApi and the other defendants, increasing their litigation burden and keeping the alleged collection practices under judicial scrutiny.
- The ruling does not establish liability, but it removes an early procedural exit for the defendants on the bulk of Reddit’s case.
Second-order effects
- AI answer products and data-access intermediaries relying on search-derived content face added pressure to document provenance and permissions, particularly where a publisher alleges circumvention rather than merely public access.
- The contrast with SerpApi’s Google result suggests plaintiffs and defendants will focus more narrowly on how material was accessed and what protections were allegedly bypassed, not simply whether information was publicly visible.
Third-order effects
- If similar claims survive early dismissal, the boundary between public web availability and permitted downstream reuse could become a more consequential constraint on AI retrieval and scraping supply chains.
- The case contributes to a fragmented rights landscape: outcomes may depend on the specific platform controls, data route and legal claim, leaving broad industry rules uncertain until more merits decisions emerge.
The trend: AI data-access disputes are moving from abstract training-data arguments toward fact-specific tests of provenance, platform controls and permission boundaries.