Amazon is investigating Perplexity, an artificial intelligence startup, for possible violations of its Cloud division rules. Perplexity is accused of scraping content from other websites without permission, disregarding the Robots Exclusion Protocol, a standard that most internet companies follow to show which pages they are not allowed to scrape. Compliance with this protocol is mandatory for websites relying on Amazon Web Services, such as Perplexity.
Forbes accused Perplexity of “direct scam” by copying articles from Forbes, CNBC, Bloomberg, and other outlets, including those behind paywalls. Wired investigated and found that Perplexity was allegedly using an unpublished IP address to track websites operated by its parent company, Condé Nast, even as it tried to block access. Other outlets like the New York Times and The Guardian also detected the same IP address visiting their servers.
Perplexity’s spokeswoman dismissed Wired’s report as inaccurate, stating that their PerplexityBot respects robots.txt and does not violate the AWS Terms of Service. Perplexity’s CEO also criticized Wired’s findings, claiming there was a deep misunderstanding of how Perplexity operates.
Forbes raised concerns about Perplexity’s feature called “Perplexity Pages,” which displays selected articles that closely mirror content from original sources but fail to credit the authors properly. Instead, Perplexity uses small logos linking back to the original sources. Forbes accused Perplexity of directly copying their work, citing an example where the Perplexity chatbot produced a version of a paywalled Forbes report on Eric Schmidt’s military drone project without proper credit.
In response, Perplexity’s CEO acknowledged the tool had “rough edges” but denied any wrongdoing. Amazon confirmed it was investigating Perplexity’s practices, and the company stated that it values its partnership with AWS and appreciates the collaboration.
Overall, Perplexity is under scrutiny for allegedly scraping content from various websites without permission and not complying with industry standards, which has raised concerns about its practices and potential violations of regulations. The investigation highlights the importance of following protocols and respecting intellectual property rights in the digital age.
Article Source
https://nypost.com/2024/06/28/business/amazon-probing-ai-startup-perplexity-for-scraping-sites-without-permission/