Perplexity AI Partners with Getty Images in Major Licensing Deal
▼ Summary
– Perplexity signed a multi-year licensing deal with Getty Images to display Getty’s images in its AI search tools, marking a shift toward formal content partnerships.
– The agreement legitimizes Perplexity’s prior use of Getty’s stock photos, which had faced copyright infringement questions and plagiarism accusations from news outlets.
– Perplexity has faced legal challenges, including a lawsuit from Reddit alleging unlawful scraping of user content and circumvention of data access measures.
– The deal will enable Perplexity to display images with proper attribution, including credits and links back to the original source in search results.
– Perplexity defends its use of publisher content as “fair use,” arguing that publicly available facts are not copyrightable, even when sourced from paywalled or restricted content.
In a significant move for the AI search sector, Perplexity AI has entered into a multi-year licensing partnership with Getty Images, allowing the startup to legally incorporate Getty’s extensive image library into its AI-driven search and discovery platforms. This collaboration represents a strategic pivot for Perplexity, which has recently faced scrutiny over content scraping and plagiarism claims, and underscores its commitment to forging official content relationships.
According to a source familiar with the arrangement, Perplexity and Getty have collaborated for over a year, with Getty previously participating in Perplexity’s Publishers’ Program, an initiative designed to share advertising revenue with publishers when their material appears in search results. The newly announced agreement is distinct from earlier arrangements. While specifics remain confidential, the source indicated that the licensing structure differs from traditional lump-sum models, reflecting the fact that Perplexity does not develop its own foundational AI models.
This partnership effectively legitimizes Perplexity’s prior use of Getty’s stock imagery, which had drawn criticism. Last year, multiple news organizations accused the startup of plagiarism, including one instance where Perplexity reproduced content from a Wall Street Journal article along with an accompanying Getty photo. At the time, media outlets raised concerns about potential copyright infringement, and although sources indicated that a Getty agreement was in progress, the deal could not be confirmed until now.
More recently, Perplexity encountered legal action from Reddit, which alleged “industrial-scale, unlawful” scraping of user-generated content and accused the AI firm of bypassing technical protections. Reddit has its own data licensing agreement with OpenAI, highlighting the growing importance of formal content partnerships in the AI industry.
Under the new arrangement, Perplexity will enhance how it presents images in search results, displaying proper credits and links back to original sources. Nick Unsworth, Getty’s Vice President of Strategic Development, emphasized that the agreement “acknowledges the importance of properly attributed consent and its value in enhancing AI-powered products.”
Echoing this sentiment, Jessica Chan, Perplexity’s Head of Content and Publisher Partnerships, stated, “Attribution and accuracy are fundamental to how people should understand the world in an age of AI. Together, we’re helping people discover answers through powerful visual storytelling while ensuring they always know where that content comes from and who created it.”
Perplexity’s focus on attribution forms a key part of its defense against copyright allegations, as the company maintains that its use of publisher content, including material behind paywalls or explicitly marked against scraping, qualifies as “fair use,” since publicly available facts cannot be copyrighted.
(Source: TechCrunch)
