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From Matthias Bastian (The Decoder) Tuesday:

Landmark German ruling declares Google’s AI Overviews are Google’s own words and makes it liable for false answers ….

The Regional Court of Munich hit Google with a temporary injunction barring the company from spreading false claims about two Munich-based publishers through its AI-generated search overviews (case no. 26 O 869/26). The court classified Google as a direct infringer because the “AI overview” is its own content, not just a list of search results.

Google’s AI overviews had falsely tied two publishing companies to scams, subscription traps, and shady business practices for certain search queries. According to the court, the AI mixed up information about other, genuinely sketchy companies with the plaintiffs and drew connections that didn’t appear in any of the linked sources. The publishers sent Google a cease-and-desist letter, but Google didn’t respond appropriately….

Google’s AI overviews work nothing like traditional search results, the court argues. The AI rewrites and judges results “in its own words and according to its own structure,” the ruling says. In the case at hand, for example, it opened with confident claims like “Yes, [company] is known for dubious business practices,” then built its own structure with a summary, red flags for the alleged scam, and tips for users.

The court also found that the AI overview made claims “that are not even made in the search results.” None of the linked sources drew any connection between the plaintiffs and the shady companies the AI mentioned. The court called these “the defendant’s own statements.” …

At the hearing, Google argued that users could check the linked sources themselves to verify whether the AI summary was correct. Users generally knew “that information generated with AI should not be blindly trusted,” the company claimed….

The court rejected this. The possibility of disproving a statement through further research doesn’t “regularly exempt from liability for this statement.” …

I am told the judgment itself is this one, though I haven’t reviewed a translated copy myself.

Under American law, I think Google AI would likewise be potentially subject to liability even though Google Search wouldn’t be: 47 U.S.C. § 230. As I wrote in 2023,

Section 230 states that, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” “[I]nformation content provider” is defined to cover “any person or entity that is responsible, in whole or in part, for the creation or development of information provided through the Internet or any other interactive computer service.”A lawsuit against an AI company would aim to treat it as publisher or speaker of information provided by itself, as an entity “that is responsible, in whole or in part, for the creation or development of [such] information.”

As the leading early § 230 precedent, Zeran v. AOL, pointed out, in § 230 “Congress made a policy choice … not to deter harmful online speech through the … route of imposing tort liability on companies that serve as intermediaries for other parties’ potentially injurious messages.” But Congress didn’t make the choice to immunize companies that themselves create messages that had never been expressed by third parties. Section 230 thus doesn’t immunize defendants who “materially contribut[e] to [the] alleged unlawfulness” of online content.

An AI company, by making and distributing an AI program that creates false and reputation-damaging accusations out of text that entirely lacks such accusations, is surely “materially contribut[ing] to [the] alleged unlawfulness” of that created material….

Relatedly, traditional § 230 cases at least in theory allow someone—the actual creator of the speech—to be held liable for it (even if in practice the creator may be hard to identify, or outside the jurisdiction, or lack the money to pay damages). Allowing § 230 immunity for libels output by an AI program would completely cut off any recourse for the libeled person, against anyone.

In any event, as noted above, § 230 doesn’t protect entities that “materially contribut[e] to [the] alleged unlawfulness” of online content. And when AI programs output defamatory text that they have themselves assembled, word by word, they are certainly materially contributing to its defamatory nature.

Likewise, as I argued in my Large Libel Models? Liability for AI Output, if an AI company is alerted that its software is regularly outputting specific false statements about a person or business, and doesn’t take prompt and reasonable steps to stop that, it could be held liable even under a knowing/reckless falsehood. (I also argued that it could be liable for proven damages caused to private figures even under a negligent design standard.)

In any event, I can’t speak to whether the German court’s decision is consistent with broader principles of German law, but from the press account it sounds like the analysis under U.S. law would likely be in many ways similar (except for the temporary injunction, which I expect would be harder to get, though not necessarily impossible). For more posts on Large Libel Models, see here.

The post Large Libel Models Ruling in Germany, Allowing Liability Against Google AI appeared first on Reason.com.

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Earlier, I offered some high-level thoughts on the latest episode of As the Couch Turns. Here, I want to drill down into the details.

First, the Eleventh Circuit’s decision to make this reprimand private must be contrasted with the Ninth Circuit’s decision to make Judge Nelson’s investigation public. I agree with Arthur Hellman that the Ninth Circuit had the authority to make this proceeding public, but the Chief Judge was not obligated to. Judge Nelson has been charged with minor offenses. Given his lack of criminal history, the charges are likely to be dismissed. All of this may come to nothing. But now there is a permanent statement from the Ninth Circuit that Judge Nelson may have engaged in misconduct.

The Eleventh Circuit made the incomprehensible decision to make the reprimand private, but include so many facts that her identity could be readily determined. I am inclined to follow Hanlon’s Razor here to explain the explanation. If it was intentional, then the members of the Judicial Council may have engaged in misconduct to bypass the confidentiality rules by subterfuge.

Second, Judge Ross sent her three-sentence apology letters on May 27, 2026. She did this after being given a sweetheart deal that not even Alex Acosta would have approved. And she spit in the face of her colleagues. She thought she could squeak by without offering any remorse, even though her identity was widely known.

Third, Judge Ross’s brazenness forced her brave law clerks to once again reach out to the judicial process that had failed them before. They told the Judicial Council they “do not believe the letters of apology we received from Judge Ross comply with the remedial measures recommended by the Special Committee and adopted by the Council. Specifically, the apologies fail to ‘make clear to the recipient the sexual misconduct for which the judge is apologizing.'”

On June 10, Chief Judge Pryor then gave Judge Ross a chance to “respond to the above allegations and state whether you failed to send adequate letters of apology to your former clerks.” This offer to correct the record, yet again, is inexplicable. There is nothing to explain. She failed to do what she promised she would do. Of course the rules permit “appropriate corrective action,” but Judge Ross is not a first-time offender. She has proven herself to be an inveterate liar who abuses process to save her skin. No law student or law clerk or law partner would ever be given this many chances.

Judge Ross (or ChatGPT) then wrote an apology letter to the three clerks.

“I am writing to you for a second time to convey my deepest apologies for my harmful, offensive, and unprofessional behavior that made your clerkship an unpleasant experience. My initial letter was entirely deficient, as I did not take full accountability for my actions, and I failed to give you the apology that you deserve.”

Ross’s chambers provided this letter to Bloomberg Law (and probably others).

The following day, Judge Pryor wrote back to say he would not identify a new complaint:

Based on my review of your new apology letters, my disclosure of the June 10 inquiry to The New York Times, and your consent to disclose the apology letters to the New York Times, I have determined not to identify a new complaint under Rule 5.

I am very confused by this chronology. First, the Eleventh Circuit Judicial Council and the JC&D Committee agreed to make the reprimand private. But the Chief Judge, acting by himself, decided to publicize the matter to the New York Times? How does Chief Judge Pryor have this authority? Did the other (unnamed) members of the Council agree to this plan? Moreover, it seems that Pryor decided not to investigate Ross further based on her making her private reprimand into a public reprimand. How does he have that authority? Judge Ross would have never consented to any reprimand if it was public. Judge Pryor nullified the cornerstone of the Judicial Council’s agreement with Judge Ross. Finally, she already engaged in misconduct by not following the terms of the agreement. There was on need for further fact-finding.

This entire situation stinks, and continues to stink more by the day.

Judge Pryor’s conduct here has not been exemplary. I say this with some pause, because I have long respected and worked with Judge Pryor on many matters. The problem speaks to a broader issue: Chief Judges have vast amounts of unstated powers. And absolute power can be wielded in improper fashions. Vindictive chief judges (like Kimberly Moore) can rule their circuits like petty tyrants. Magnanimous chief judges (like Bill Pryor) can provide too solicitous treatment of offending judges.

Congress needs to revisit this entire regime.

The post The Latest Chicanery in Judge Ross's Case appeared first on Reason.com.

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Given the recent success of Backrooms, a movie based on a YouTube series that was itself based on a meme, it’s tempting to view Steven Spielberg’s often crackling but frequently frustrating Disclosure Day in the same light. This is the beard’s riff on the old “ancient aliens” meme, the popular-on-the-internet History Channel freeze frame featuring a zap-haired “expert” who somehow always seemed to be conveying the same amusingly crazy idea: I’m not saying it was ancient aliens—but it was ancient aliens. 

Spoiler alert: In Spielberg’s movie, the aliens aren’t quite ancient; they’ve only been around since the 1940s, at least as far as the United States government and its sinister corporate tentacles know. But this isn’t much of a spoiler, given the trailers and the fact that the basics of alien existence are revealed to the viewer by the end of the first act. 

Indeed, that’s the setup, rather than the resolution: aliens exist, there is copious archival footage to prove it, and shadowy forces have been engaged in a massive cover-up in order to gain power over alien technology and cow the public. The movie, then, is about the quest to release the evidence to the world. 

That quest starts with the hacker Daniel Kellner, played with quiet intensity by the increasingly excellent Josh O’Connor, who makes off with a cache of drives containing classified footage depicting alien contact and technology as the movie opens. It expands quickly to a consortium of aliens-are-real devotees led by Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo), as well as Margaret Fairchild (a marvelous Emily Blunt), a scatterbrained local TV weather woman who finds herself speaking in foreign, even alien, tongues. Kellner and Fairchild are connected by a kind of psychic alien destiny, like Elliot and E.T. in Spielberg’s kiddie-alien classic, and Wakefield is something like a John the Baptist figure, preparing the way for the prophets of the stars. 

The challenge they face is that the secret of alien existence has been hidden by Wardex, a nefarious corporation with ties to the U.S. military that has been hiding the revealing footage. The corporation’s central figure is Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), who has appropriated some alien tech for himself in the form of a little stone obelisk that, when clutched, allows him to create a psychic connection with others, including Kellner’s girlfriend Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson). The scenes where he burrows into her mind, like a hacker pwning a network, are electric, and nearly make up for the fact that none of this makes even a single alien blood droplet of sense. 

The movie’s problems start with the fact that everyone speaks in breathless riddles and oblique teases, as if they are background characters on some late-breaking spinoff of Lost, rather than explaining themselves in clear language to each other. But the bigger problem is the nature of the disclosure itself. 

Spielberg wants viewers to take for granted that aliens are real, and that the video proof, contained on what amounts to a bunch of thumb drives, would simply and instantly convince everyone who sees it. The videos themselves look like what they are—Hollywood fakes made using a combination of computer effects, costumes, and puppetry. Often, they are just seconds long. Sometimes they are shot in the grainy, blurry style of real-world, official UFO footage, which as we know proves little and fails to convince many people. Sometimes they are a good bit clearer, but in a way that makes them look like high-end Hollywood frauds. 

The movie simply assumes that broadcasting this footage to the world will convince the general public that aliens are real. Most of the movie’s second act is organized around the mad dash to get the footage out, which turns out to mean playing it on a local NBC News affiliate. (The movie is distributed by Universal, part of the same media conglomerate that owns NBC.) By the very end, the movie conveniently hopscotches this problem, but it does so in a way that renders the quest to broadcast the footage, which is to say most of the movie’s narrative, completely unnecessary.

For most of the movie’s runtime, however, the plan is simply for a hacker and a local TV weather reporter to release the footage. I know Blunt’s character is just a fun-loving weather personality, but surely she has some sense of journalistic values? Has anyone in this movie heard of verification? Asking for comment? This is why no one trusts the media.  

Indeed, this is part of what makes this movie so odd: It’s set in a contemporary United States, in which it’s assumed that essentially everyone does trust the media. There are iPhones and internet connections, but we see no podcasters, no YouTubers, not even any skeptical mainstream media pundits, let alone the sort of sketchy, attention-seeking politicians who would want to turn this headline news event into fodder for self-aggrandizement. Aliens are real, and that’s why we must tax billionaires and oligarchs, now please donate to my campaign, said no one in this movie. 

From Close Encounters of the Third Kind to E.T. to that one Indiana Jones movie that we’ve all tried to forget about, Spielberg has long been obsessed with aliens. Here, he wants to hammer home a grand, heartwarming idea about how radical empathy is what connects people, animals, and perhaps even big-eyed mystical space aliens, but the movie is almost shockingly naive about the willingness of the masses to peacefully and productively converge around a controversial belief. In the movie’s dramatic scheme, the only significant barrier to their acceptance of alien life is a villainous corporate entity with an impressively large collection of tactical vests and black vehicles.

The good news is that on a scene-by-scene basis, Disclosure Day is taught, thrilling, and worth arguing with, which is to say it’s a Steven Spielberg movie. The bad news is that it exists in an unrecognizable parallel universe—and not because of the beings from outer space. The world of Disclosure Day is a world without ancient aliens-obsessed wacko experts, without memespeak nihilism, without paranoiacs and grifting conspiracy mongers, without partisan argument or propaganda or meaningful skepticism of any kind. This movie isn’t actually a meme, but it probably should have had more of them. 

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