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Does Meta buy business data?

By SourceX Editorial · Updated

Short answer

Meta has not been reported to run a program buying ordinary business data, and unlike OpenAI or Microsoft it has fewer confirmed publisher licensing deals. Instead, Meta faces active copyright litigation, including a May 2026 class action from Elsevier, Cengage, Hachette, Macmillan, McGraw Hill and author Scott Turow alleging it used pirated books and torrented content to train its Llama models. Meta disputes the claims and says its training qualifies as fair use.

The publisher lawsuit#

Reuters and Variety reported that five major publishers and author Scott Turow sued Meta and CEO Mark Zuckerberg in May 2026 in the Southern District of New York, alleging willful copyright infringement from torrenting and scraping millions of books and articles to train Llama.

A separate case, Farnsworth v. Meta, also alleged Meta used pirated books from shadow libraries; Meta has said courts have found AI training on copyrighted material can qualify as fair use and that it will fight the suits.

Licensing activity is comparatively limited#

Digiday's December 2025 publisher scorecard noted Meta entered the AI licensing market only within roughly the prior six months relative to Microsoft and Amazon, suggesting it has been a later and smaller participant in paid content deals than competitors.

  1. 01Your work records
  2. 02Personal details removed
  3. 03You approve the release
  4. 04Licensed to AI developers
How it works with SourceX: Your work records → Personal details removed → You approve the release → Licensed to AI developers.Illustrative

What this means for a business#

The lawsuits against Meta are a reminder that even large companies face serious legal risk when training data isn't clearly licensed; a business considering any data relationship with an AI company should ask directly how the data will be used and get that commitment in writing.

A U.S. company with years of internal records can reduce its own risk by removing personal and confidential details and limiting any shared data to what it clearly owns, rather than assuming informal interest from a large AI company implies a safe, documented deal.

SourceX and Meta#

SourceX is not affiliated with Meta. This page summarizes public reports; it does not mean Meta buys data through SourceX.

Frequently asked questions

Is Meta being sued over its training data?

Yes. Publishers including Elsevier, Hachette and Macmillan, along with author Scott Turow, filed suit in May 2026, and a separate case (Farnsworth v. Meta) raised similar claims.

Has Meta signed publisher licensing deals like OpenAI?

Reporting from Digiday indicates Meta entered the AI content licensing market later and with a smaller footprint than OpenAI or Microsoft.

What is Meta's defense?

Meta has said courts have found that training AI on copyrighted material can qualify as fair use and stated it will fight the lawsuits aggressively.

Sources

Public sources, checked 2026-10-09. SourceX is not affiliated with the organizations named.

  1. Major publishers sued Meta for copyright infringement over AI training in May 2026 reuters.com
  2. Meta's response stating training AI on copyrighted material can qualify as fair use variety.com
  3. Details of the publisher class action against Meta and Zuckerberg over Llama training publishers.org
  4. Meta entered the AI licensing deal market later than Microsoft and Amazon digiday.com

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