The parent company of Rolling Stone magazine has filed a lawsuit against Alphabet, alleging that the artificial intelligence summary feature in its search engine illegally uses content, steals website traffic, and damages revenue.

According to reports on the 14th, Penske Media, the parent company of Rolling Stone and The Hollywood Reporter, filed an antitrust lawsuit in federal district court in Washington D.C. late Friday evening. The core of the lawsuit targets Alphabet's "AI Overviews" feature at the top of search results, claiming it illegally exploits the company's editorial content.

Penske Media presented direct financial impact in its complaint: since late 2024, revenue generated through online shopping affiliate links on its websites has declined by more than one-third due to reduced traffic from Alphabet. This case marks the first lawsuit by a major news media conglomerate over direct economic losses caused by Alphabet's AI features.

Regarding these allegations, Alphabet spokesperson José Castañeda dismissed them as "baseless claims," stating that "AI Overviews" makes search more helpful, creates new opportunities for content discovery, and sends billions of clicks daily to various websites, even directing traffic to more diverse sites. Alphabet declared it will defend against these charges.

**Core Allegations: AI Overviews "Siphon" Traffic and Revenue**

Penske Media's lawsuit elaborates on what it considers damage to its business model. The complaint states that when users conduct searches, Alphabet's "AI Overviews" directly provides integrated information summaries, allowing many users to obtain needed answers without clicking through to original links. This mechanism directly "siphons" traffic that should flow to content publishers' websites.

According to the complaint, approximately 20% of Alphabet search result pages containing links to Penske Media websites feature "AI Overviews," and this proportion continues to rise. The company attributes the over one-third decline in affiliate link revenue since late 2024 to this factor. The complaint warns:

"Diverting and preventing users from visiting PMC (Penske Media Corp.) and other publishers' websites in this manner will have profound harmful effects on the overall quality and quantity of information available on the internet."

**Alphabet's Rebuttal: AI Aims to Enhance Experience and Deliver "High-Quality" Visitors**

Facing Penske Media's allegations, Alphabet maintains that its AI features benefit the content ecosystem. Beyond Gemini chatbot competing with OpenAI's ChatGPT, Alphabet has more broadly integrated AI into its core search products, including "AI Overviews" and optional "AI mode."

Alphabet spokesperson José Castañeda argued that website links appearing alongside "AI Overviews" bring publishers "higher quality" clicks, as users accessing websites through these links stay longer. Alphabet's position is that AI features improve user experience while creating new content discovery opportunities.

**Publishers' "Dilemma" and Legal Demands**

Penske Media describes in its complaint the "dilemma" it faces: either choose to block Alphabet from normally indexing its website content, which would "destroy its business," or be forced to accept Alphabet's content crawling, "adding fuel to the fire" of the AI system threatening its entire publishing business. The complaint states:

"Every article PMC publishes on its websites is equivalent to providing more training and foundational material for Alphabet's AI system to generate AI overviews or optimize its models."

The lawsuit seeks a permanent injunction from the court to stop Alphabet's alleged illegal conduct and demands unspecified monetary damages. The case plaintiffs include 13 publications under Penske, such as Billboard, Variety, and Vibe.

Penske Media's lawsuit against Alphabet represents the latest example in a series of legal conflicts between the media industry and AI companies. Previously, The Wall Street Journal and its parent company News Corp's New York Post have sued AI search company Perplexity; The New York Times has filed lawsuits against OpenAI and Microsoft. Notably, the law firm representing The New York Times case also represents Penske Media.

Meanwhile, the industry is also exploring collaborative pathways. Some technology companies have agreed to pay for using news content, such as News Corp with OpenAI, Amazon with The New York Times, and Alphabet with Associated Press reaching content cooperation agreements. Anthropic recently agreed to pay at least $1.5 billion to settle a copyright infringement lawsuit over its use of pirated books to train models.