Hachette, Cengage, Elsevier, and Scott Turow sue Google over alleged use of books in Gemini training

What happened: On July 15, 2026, Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, Elsevier, author Scott Turow and his publishing company S.C.R.I.B.E. filed a class-action-seeking copyright lawsuit against Google in New York federal court. The complaint alleges Google secretly copied millions of works that had been provided to Google Books and other services for limited purposes, then used that content to train Gemini. It further claims Gemini generates content that directly competes with the original authors, tailoring outputs to mimic specific authors' expressive elements and creative choices. Plaintiffs seek an injunction and unspecified damages.

Why it matters to creators: The case argues that content creators and publishers supplied for one declared purpose was quietly repurposed as AI training data, a claim that could affect how platforms' terms of use are interpreted for any creator who has ever uploaded work to a tech company's service.

What is not yet known: No ruling on class certification or the merits; Google had not publicly responded in the reporting reviewed.