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Rolling Stone Publisher Files AI Lawsuit Against Google

By  |  September 14, 2025
Google, lawsuits, DOJ, antitrust, advertising

The publisher behind Rolling Stone, Billboard and Variety has filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the company of using its journalism without permission to fuel AI-generated summaries that appear in search results. The complaint, lodged Friday in federal court in Washington, D.C., is the first major challenge by a U.S. publisher against Alphabet-owned Google regarding the technology, according to Reuters.

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    Penske Media, led by Jay Penske, said its websites attract around 120 million monthly visitors. The company argues that Google effectively requires publishers to allow their articles to be used in AI summaries in order to remain visible in search results. Without such leverage, the lawsuit claims, Google would be forced to negotiate payments for republishing content or for training its artificial intelligence models. The suit pointed to a previous federal court finding that Google held nearly 90% of the U.S. search market.

    Penske alleged that roughly one in five searches leading to its websites now display “AI Overviews” and warned that the figure is likely to rise. The company reported that declining search traffic has cut affiliate revenue by more than a third compared to its peak by the end of 2024. “We have a responsibility to proactively fight for the future of digital media and preserve its integrity – all of which is threatened by Google’s current actions,” Penske said.

    Related: Google Ordered to Pay $425 Million Over Privacy Breach

    Google responded on Saturday by defending the feature, per Reuters. A company spokesperson said AI overviews make search more useful and open new opportunities for content discovery, calling the lawsuit’s claims “meritless.”

    The case comes amid broader industry concern that Google’s dominance leaves publishers with little room to negotiate. Danielle Coffey, CEO of the News/Media Alliance, told Reuters that unlike OpenAI and other AI developers that have struck licensing deals with publishers such as News Corp, the Financial Times and The Atlantic, Google has been slower to reach agreements. “When you have the massive scale and market power that Google has, you are not obligated to abide by the same norms. That is the problem,” Coffey said.

    Earlier this year, online education firm Chegg also sued Google, alleging that its AI overviews undermined demand for original content.

    Source: Reuters