🔍 Read the full analysis: What The EU Court Adviser’s AI Opinion Could Change For Publishers on ThorstenMeyerAI.com
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TL;DR
On Nov. 3, 2026, Advocate General Maciej Szpunar advised the EU Court of Justice that AI chatbots may infringe press publishers’ rights if they access articles unlawfully or reproduce their distinctive expression so extensively that users need not visit the original. He said the test does not appear to be met in the Hungarian dispute over a Gemini summary, and the Court’s final ruling is still pending.
Advocate General Maciej Szpunar advised the European Union’s Court of Justice on Nov. 3 that AI chatbots can, in some circumstances, infringe press publishers’ rights when they retrieve and reuse online news articles in answers. In Case C‑250/25, Like Company v Google Ireland, he proposed a test focused on unlawful access or answers that reproduce an article’s distinctive expression so closely that users can do without the original; the opinion is not binding, and the Court has not yet ruled.
The dispute began after Like Company, which operates Hungarian news portals, sued Google in Hungary. The company says Google used its articles to train Gemini and repeatedly reproduced and made them available through the chatbot between June 13, 2023, and May 31, 2024, according to the Court of Justice’s press release. The Hungarian court referred four questions to Luxembourg, including whether the EU press publishers’ right applies to model training and chatbot answers.
Szpunar’s proposed test for chatbot answers has two main elements. A publisher could have a claim if a chatbot obtained an article by getting around an access restriction, such as a paywall or anti-scraping measure. A claim could also arise if the chatbot’s answer carries over the article’s recognizable form of expression to the point that a user can dispense with visiting the publication. Repeating the same facts alone would not be enough, under the opinion.
On the specific example, Szpunar said the conditions for infringement did not appear to be present: he found no indication of access barriers or recognizable wording in the answer, and noted that Google appeared to have safeguards. That is his assessment, not a finding by the Hungarian court. On training, he advised that those questions be declared inadmissible because the record did not show that the articles were used to train Gemini. His additional discussion of training was expressly offered “for the sake of completeness.”
Infographic 01 · Where the line runs
When a chatbot answer infringes a publisher's right
Advocate General Szpunar's test in Case C‑250/25 for chatbots that retrieve news articles in real time and reuse them in their answers.
Stays free
- Reporting the same facts. Nobody owns the news itself (pts 199–200).
- A short factual summary, presented differently (pt 208).
- An overview built from several sources, restructured, with links back (pts 208, 234).
- Individual words or very short extracts (pt 201).
Can infringe
- Getting around a paywall or anti-scraping block to fetch the article (pt 188).
- An answer that keeps the article’s structure and phrasing, even paraphrased, so readers can skip the original (pts 202, 205, 207).
- Systematically recognisable articles in answers to related questions: making available to the public (pts 213, 240).
The test, step by step
For a chatbot that fetches a news article live (RAG) and answers a user
- Is it an online use by a service in the EU?Yes for RAG answers to EU users, wherever the servers are (pts 165–169).
- Did the bot get in lawfully?No circumvention of effective technical measures (pt 188).
- Is the article’s form of expression recognisable in the answer, to the point of substitution?Side-by-side comparison; facts do not count (pts 196–209).
- Is the provider responsible?If inherent to its business model, or no reasonable measures such as respecting blocks and output filters (pts 221–222).
- Temporary copies during retrieval are then exempt under Art. 5(1) InfoSoc; the TDM exception does not apply to RAG (pts 179–189).
An Advocate General’s opinion, not a judgment. General information, not legal advice.
Sources: Opinion of AG Szpunar, C‑250/25 (provisional text), CURIA press release No 155/26 (3 Nov 2026). Point numbers refer to the provisional text.
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A Narrower Test for Chatbot Reuse
The opinion could shape how publishers and AI companies assess the use of news content if the Court adopts its reasoning. It distinguishes the underlying facts in a report from the protected way those facts are expressed. That would leave publishers without a general right to control every AI answer about a news event, while potentially giving them grounds to challenge answers that reproduce distinctive wording or bypass protections on their sites.
For AI services, the proposed line puts practical weight on how articles are accessed and how answers are composed. Services that retrieve web pages live may need to account for access restrictions and avoid outputs that function as substitutes for the source article. For publishers, the opinion could support arguments for licensing in cases involving extensive reuse, but it does not establish a general requirement that chatbots license every factual summary. The commercial and legal effects depend on the final judgment and how national courts apply it.
Readers could also be affected. If the Court follows the adviser’s approach, AI answers may continue to summarize news, but services could face pressure to link to original reporting, respect technical barriers, and avoid close paraphrase. The opinion itself does not require any particular product change, and it does not determine what Google must do in this dispute.
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From Google News to Gemini
The right at issue is the press publishers’ right in Article 15(1) of the EU Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive, adopted in 2019. Szpunar’s opinion recalls that the law was designed in part to let publishers control and license uses of extracts by online services such as news aggregators. The present case asks whether that right also reaches material returned by a generative chatbot.
The example at the center of the case concerned a Hungarian article published in July 2023 about a singer’s alleged plan to bring dolphins to Lake Balaton. A user asked Gemini to summarize the article, and the chatbot produced a Hungarian-language summary. Szpunar considered the use to be live retrieval from a website, a method known as retrieval-augmented generation, rather than evidence that the article had been included in training data.
The Advocate General reasoned that the training questions were not supported by evidence that Like Company’s articles were in Gemini’s training set. He also said that dedicated-computer training is not “online use” covered by the press publishers’ right. Separately, and not as the basis for resolving those questions, he said the EU text-and-data-mining exception generally covers training in principle, subject to the possibility for rights holders to opt out in a machine-readable form. The Court’s press release identifies this as the first generative AI case to reach it. Nine EU governments and the European Commission submitted written observations, and a hearing took place on March 10, 2026.
The Court Has Not Ruled
An Advocate General’s opinion is independent legal advice to the Court, not a binding judgment. The Court of Justice may follow it, modify its reasoning, or reach a different conclusion. No date for the final judgment has been announced.
The Hungarian court will ultimately decide the underlying dispute. The available source material does not establish that Like Company’s articles were used in Gemini’s training data, nor does the opinion settle whether any specific answer or safeguard violated EU law. The facts about the example answer and Google’s safeguards are discussed in Szpunar’s assessment; they have not been confirmed here as final judicial findings. It also remains to be seen how any eventual ruling would apply to other AI systems, publishers, access controls, or forms of reuse.
Awaiting the Luxembourg Judgment
The next major step is the Court of Justice’s judgment in Case C‑250/25. The Court has not set a date. Its 2025 statistics put the average duration of preliminary-reference proceedings at 16.9 months, but that figure does not establish when this case will be decided.
After the EU court answers the referred questions, the Hungarian court will apply its interpretation to Like Company’s claims and the evidence in the case. Until then, publishers and AI services have an adviser’s proposed legal test, not a final ruling requiring a particular licensing arrangement, product change, or outcome.
Key Questions
Has the EU Court ruled that Gemini infringed publishers’ rights?
No. Advocate General Szpunar issued a non-binding opinion. The Court of Justice has not yet delivered its judgment, and the Hungarian court still has to decide the dispute.
When could a chatbot answer infringe under the opinion?
Szpunar said infringement may arise if a chatbot obtains an article by bypassing access barriers or reproduces its distinctive expression so extensively that a user can do without the original. Sharing the same facts alone would not meet that test.
Did the opinion find that Gemini was trained on Like Company’s articles?
No. Szpunar advised that the training questions be treated as inadmissible because the record did not establish that the articles were used for training. His separate comments about training and text-and-data mining were supplementary, not a finding about Gemini’s data.
What happens after the Advocate General’s opinion?
The Court of Justice will issue a judgment interpreting the EU law questions referred by the Hungarian court. The Court has not announced a date; the Hungarian court will then apply that interpretation to the case.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
