Senators tell ByteDance to ‘immediately shut down’ Seedance AI video app; CNBC, March 17, 2026

 Emily Wilkins, CNBC ;  Senators tell ByteDance to ‘immediately shut down’ Seedance AI video app

"Sens. Marsha Blackburn and Peter Welch are calling for a halt to the new version of ByteDance’s artificial intelligence app, Seedance, which generates videos of real people and licensed characters, raising copyright and intellectual property concerns. 

Seedance 2.0 “is the most glaring example of copyright infringement from a ByteDance product to date, and you must immediately shut down Seedance and implement meaningful safeguards to prevent further infringing outputs,” Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Welch, D-Vt., wrote in a letter to ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo that was first obtained by CNBC.

Their letter is a sign of growing concerns on Capitol Hill about how AI companies are developing and using their models and whether proper protections are in place for those who generate the materials the models train from."

ByteDance’s Controversial AI Video Model Reportedly on Hold Globally Due to Copyright Disputes; Gizmodo, March 14, 2026

 MIKE PEARL  , Gizmodo; ByteDance’s Controversial AI Video Model Reportedly on Hold Globally Due to Copyright Disputes

"According to two anonymous leakers who spoke to the Information, the global release of Seedance 2.0 is on hold amid legal action from movie studios and streaming services.

When it was initially released, Seedance 2.0 appeared to have few if any protections in place to prevent users from generating videos appearing to star celebrities, copyrighted characters, and celebrities as copyrighted characters."

Hollywood studios escalate dispute over ByteDance’s ‘pervasive copyright infringement’ with its AI tools; Los Angeles Times, February 23, 2026

 Cerys Davies, Los Angeles Times; Hollywood studios escalate dispute over ByteDance’s ‘pervasive copyright infringement’ with its AI tools

"Following the lead of several major Hollywood studios, the Motion Picture Assn. has sent its own cease-and-desist letter to ByteDance, the company behind the controversial artificial-intelligence video generator Seedance 2.0.

The trade association, which represents the interests of major film and TV studios, sent a notice to the Chinese company, reflecting its members’ collective response to “ByteDance’s pervasive copyright infringement.” MPA argues that Seedance’s unauthorized use of copyrighted materials is a “feature, not a bug.” 

The letter, sent Friday, marks the first time the MPA has forwarded a cease-and-desist to a major AI firm and represents a further escalation of tensions between the entertainment industry and an AI company."

Hollywood's copyright fight meets China's AI boom; Axios, February 19, 2026

 Madison Mills, Sara Fischer, Axios; Hollywood's copyright fight meets China's AI boom

"The big picture: Hollywood is leaning on copyright law to rein in Seedance, but legal pressure hasn't slowed the rise of Chinese AI models more broadly."

ByteDance says it will add safeguards to Seedance 2.0 following Hollywood backlash; CNBC, February 16, 2026

 Dylan Butts, CNBC; ByteDance says it will add safeguards to Seedance 2.0 following Hollywood backlash

"Chinese tech giant ByteDance has said it will strengthen safeguards on a new artificial intelligence video-making tool, following complaints of copyright theft from entertainment giants. 

The tool, Seedance 2.0, enables users to create realistic videos based on text prompts. However, viral videos shared online appear to show copyrighted characters and celebrity likenesses, raising intellectual property concerns in the U.S. 

“ByteDance respects intellectual property rights and we have heard the concerns regarding Seedance 2.0,” a company spokesperson said in a statement shared with CNBC."

Scoop: Disney sends cease and desist letter to ByteDance over Seedance 2.0; Axios, February 13, 2026

 Sara Fischer, Axios; Scoop: Disney sends cease and desist letter to ByteDance over Seedance 2.0

"The Walt Disney Company on Friday sent a cease-and-desist letter to ByteDance, alleging the Chinese tech giant has been infringing on its works to train and develop an AI video generation model without compensation, according to a copy of the letter obtained by Axios.

Why it matters: It's the most serious action a Hollywood studio has taken so far against ByteDance since it launched Seedance 2.0 on Thursday. 

Zoom in: The letter, addressed to ByteDance global general counsel John Rogovin, accuses ByteDance of pre-packaging its Seedance service "with a pirated library of Disney's copyrighted characters from Star Wars, Marvel, and other Disney franchises, as if Disney's coveted intellectual property were free public domain clip art." 

"Over Disney's well-publicized objections, ByteDance is hijacking Disney's characters by reproducing, distributing, and creating derivative works featuring those characters. ByteDance's virtual smash-and-grab of Disney's IP is willful, pervasive, and totally unacceptable," Disney's outside attorney David Singer wrote. 

"We believe this is just the tip of the iceberg – which is shocking considering Seedance has only been available for a few days," he added.

Between the lines: The letter includes a slew of examples of infringing Seedance videos that feature Disney's copyrighted characters, including Spider-Man, Darth Vader, Star Wars' Grogu (Baby Yoda), Peter Griffin from Family Guy and others."

Ex-Google engineer found guilty of stealing AI secrets for China; Axios, February 2, 2026

 Rebecca Falconer, Axios; Ex-Google engineer found guilty of stealing AI secrets for China

"A former Google engineer was found guilty of economic espionage and theft of confidential AI technology for the benefit of China's government, the FBI said Monday.

Why it matters: Intelligence and defense officials have long warned of increased efforts by Beijing and others to obtain U.S. intellectual property and use AI against American interests.

State of play: A federal jury in San Francisco convicted Linwei Ding, also known as Leon Ding, 38, of seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of theft of trade secrets, per an FBI post on X Monday."

Young people in China have a new alternative to marriage and babies: AI pets; The Washington Post, February 6, 2026

Huiyee Chiew

 and 

Rudy Lu

, The Washington Post; Young people in China have a new alternative to marriage and babies: AI pets

"While China and the United States vie for supremacy in the artificial intelligence race, China is pulling ahead when it comes to finding ways to apply AI tools to everyday uses — from administering local government and streamlining police work to warding off loneliness. People falling in love with chatbots has captured headlines in the U.S., and the AI pet craze in China adds a new, furry dimension to the evolving human relationship with AI."

Students Are Finding New Ways to Cheat on the SAT; The New York Times, January 28, 2026

Stephanie Saul, The New York Times; Students Are Finding New Ways to Cheat on the SAT

Sites in China are selling test questions, and online forums offer software that can bypass test protections, according to tutors and testing experts raising alarms.

"Three years ago, after nearly a century of testing on paper, the College Board rolled out a new digital SAT.

Students who had long relied on No. 2 pencils to take the exam would instead use their laptops. One advantage, the College Board said, was a reduced chance of cheating, in part because delivering the test online meant the questions would vary for each student.

Now, however, worries are growing that the College Board’s security isn’t fail safe. Fueling the concerns are what appear to be copies of recently administered digital SAT questions that have been posted on the internet — on social media sites as well as websites primarily housed in China...

Test questions also have been sold on Telegram, a Dubai-based platform, and posted on Scribd, a subscription digital repository of data. Students have also circulated questions among themselves on Google docs, the European tutor said. Many of the tests have been removed from Scribd, apparently at the College Board’s request. A spokesman for Scribd, based in San Francisco, said the company responds to valid requests to remove copyrighted material.

But the College Board has been unable to fight bluebook.plus, according to an email exchange with the College Board that the tutor shared."

Google Engineer Disputes AI Secrets in China Espionage Trial; Bloomberg Law, January 12, 2026

 Isaiah Poritz, Bloomberg Law; Google Engineer Disputes AI Secrets in China Espionage Trial

"Former Google LLC engineer Linwei Ding on the first day of his criminal trial pushed back on allegations that he stole over 100 valuable AI trade secrets from the tech giant to start a business in China, arguing that the documents he copied don’t meet the legal definition of a trade secret."

China is using American AI against the U.S. Here’s how to stop it.; The Washington Post, December 29, 2025

 Jack Crovitz, The Washington Post; China is using American AI against the U.S. Here’s how to stop it.

"An agent of the Chinese domestic security state recently asked an artificial intelligence model to plan a sophisticated surveillance system targeting the minority Uyghur population. This system would compile police records, real-time transportation data and other information to help the Chinese government track and control Uyghurs. The agent called it a “Warning Model for High-Risk Uyghur Individuals.”

You might assume that the AI model in question was produced by a Chinese lab such as DeepSeek, Zhipu AI or Moonshot AI, all of which cooperate closely with the Chinese government. Yet the model the Chinese Communist Party agent chose to plan this instrument of oppression came not from China but from Silicon Valley. It was OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

OpenAI quickly banned that user from accessing ChatGPT. (The Washington Post has a content partnership with OpenAI.) But this was not the first time the CCP has used American frontier AI models for its authoritarian agenda — and unless the United States acts now to set basic security standards for its AI labs, such exploitation will continue apace. That would be a grave danger to American freedom and security...

American taxpayers and investors are allocating hundreds of billions of dollars to ensure that the U.S. develops the world’s most advanced AI. It would be a catastrophic strategic failure if this investment produces systems that are immediately weaponized by our adversaries to subvert American freedom, prosperity and national security.

America must safeguard its most valuable technology, secure its labs and ensure that U.S. innovation serves U.S. interests."

Rare footage from trial of Chinese general who defied Tiananmen crackdown order leaked online; The Guardian, December 23, 2025

Amy Hawkins, The Guardian; Rare footage from trial of Chinese general who defied Tiananmen crackdown order leaked online

"Rare footage of a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) general who defied orders to lead his troops into Tiananmen Square and crush the 1989 student protesters has been leaked online, offering a highly unusual glimpse into the upper echelons of the military at one of the most fraught moments in modern Chinese history.

General Xu Qinxian’s refusal to take his troops from the PLA’s prestigious 38th Group Army, a unit based on the outskirts of Beijing, into the capital has been the stuff of Tiananmen lore for decades.

The six-hour video recording of Gen Xu’s court martial hearing the next year sheds light on the rare act of defiance. In the video, Xu said he refused because he did not want to become “a sinner in history”.

The video “confirms the legend about Xu Qinxian”, said Zhou Fengsuo, a leader of the Tiananmen demonstrations who now lives in exile in the US. “This is the first time that we have a clear first-person view of this period,” he added."

What Parents in China See in A.I. Toys; The New York Times, December 25, 2025

Jiawei Wang, The New York Times; What Parents in China See in A.I. Toys

"A video of a child crying over her broken A.I. chatbot stirred up conversation in China, with some viewers questioning whether the gadgets are good for children. But the girl’s father says it’s more than a toy; it’s a family member."

Disney, Warner Urge Judge Against Tossing AI-Copyright Lawsuit; Bloomberg Law, December 26, 2025

Annelise Levy

, Bloomberg Law ; Disney, Warner Urge Judge Against Tossing AI-Copyright Lawsuit

"The studios’ said they’d engaged specialists in Singapore and China and were informed service could take eight to 24 months."

Trump Says Chips Ahoy to Xi Jinping; Wall Street Journal, December 10, 2025

The Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal; Trump Says Chips Ahoy to Xi Jinping

"President Trump said this week he will let Nvidia sell its H200 chip to China in return for the U.S. Treasury getting a 25% cut of the sales. The Indians struck a better deal when they sold Manhattan to the Dutch. Why would the President give away one of America’s chief technological advantages to an adversary and its chief economic competitor?"

Bannon, top conservatives urge White House to reject Big Tech’s ‘fair use’ push to justify AI copyright theft: ‘Un-American and absurd’; New York Post, December 1, 2025

Thomas Barrabi , New York Post; Bannon, top conservatives urge White House to reject Big Tech’s ‘fair use’ push to justify AI copyright theft: ‘Un-American and absurd’

"Prominent conservatives including Steve Bannon are urging the Trump administration to reject an increasingly popular argument that tech giants are using to rip off copyrighted material to train artificial intelligence.

So-called “fair use” doctrine – which argues that the use of copyrighted content without permission is legally justified if it is done in the public interest – has become a common defense for AI firms like Google, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta and Microsoft who have been accused of ripping off work.

The argument’s biggest backers also include White House AI czar David Sacks, who has warned that Silicon Valley firms “would be crippled” in a crucial race against AI firms in China unless they can rely on fair use protection...

Bannon and his allies threw cold water on such claims in a Monday letter addressed to US Attorney General Pam Bondi and Michael Kratsios, who heads the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy.

“This is un-American and absurd,” the conservatives argued in the letter, which was exclusively obtained by The Post. “We must compete and win the global AI race the American way — by ensuring we protect creators, children, conservatives, and communities.”...

The conservatives point to clear economic incentives to back copyright-protected industries, which contribute more than $2 trillion to the US GDP, carry an average annual wage of more than $140,000 and account for a $37 billion trade surplus, according to the letter...

The letter notes that money is no object for the companies leading the AI boom, which “enjoy virtually unlimited access to financing” and are each valued at hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars.

“In a free market, businesses pay for the inputs they need,” the letter said. “Imagine if AI CEOs claimed they needed free access to semiconductors, energy, researchers, and developers to build their products. They would be laughed out of their boardrooms.”...

The letter is the latest salvo in a heated policy divide as AI models gobble up data from the web. Critics accuse companies like Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Meta of essentially seeking a “license to steal” from news outlets, artists, authors and others that produce original work."

Are We Losing Our Democracy?; The New York Times, October 31, 2025

The Editorial Board, The New York Times; Are We Losing Our Democracy?

"Countries that slide from democracy toward autocracy tend to follow similar patterns. To measure what is happening in the United States, the Times editorial board has compiled a list of 12 markers of democratic erosion, with help from scholars who have studied this phenomenon. The sobering reality is that the United States has regressed, to different degrees, on all 12.

Our country is still not close to being a true autocracy, in the mold of Russia or China. But once countries begin taking steps away from democracy, the march often continues. We offer these 12 markers as a warning of how much Americans have already lost and how much more we still could lose."

As Trump Weighs Sale of Advanced A.I. Chips to China, Critics Sound Alarm; The New York Times, October 29, 2025

 Ana Swanson and Tripp Mickle, The New York Times; As Trump Weighs Sale of Advanced A.I. Chips to China, Critics Sound Alarm

"Mr. Trump’s comments signaled a major potential change for U.S. policy that many Washington officials warn poses a national security risk. Selling such advanced A.I. chips to China is currently banned, and U.S. officials have worked for years to restrain Beijing’s access to the cutting-edge technology.

The president’s reversal, if it comes to pass, would have widespread implications. Nvidia, which has emphasized the importance of maintaining access to the Chinese market, would reap new sales. But critics have argued that A.I. technology is important enough to potentially shift the balance of power in a strategic competition between the United States and China."

‘DeepSeek is humane. Doctors are more like machines’: my mother’s worrying reliance on AI for health advice; The Guardian, October 28, 2025

 Viola Zhou, The Guardian; ‘DeepSeek is humane. Doctors are more like machines’: my mother’s worrying reliance on AI for health advice

"Over the course of months, my mom became increasingly smitten with her new AI doctor. “DeepSeek is more humane,” my mother told me in May. “Doctors are more like machines.”"

How foreign powers are gaslighting Americans; The Washington Post, October 6, 2025

  L. Gordon Crovitz, The Washington Post; How foreign powers are gaslighting Americans

"L. Gordon Crovitz, a former publisher of The Wall Street Journal, is co-CEO of NewsGuard, which assesses the reliability of news sources and claims spreading online.

The United States has unilaterally disarmed in the information wars. The Trump administration has ended key efforts to defend against Russian, Chinese and Iranian targeting of Americans with false claims.

This disarmament includes largely dismantling the Foreign Malign Influence Center, which was the leading U.S. intelligence operation charged with “mitigating threats to democracy and U.S. national interests,” including efforts by adversaries to influence popular opinion. The U.S. also recently canceled a cooperation agreement with European allies to identify and expose disinformation operations targeting Americans and their allies. The Trump administration defends its abdication by claiming it is countering censorship, but warning of false claims by hostile governments provides Americans with more information, not less."