Malcolm Turnbull Warns Australia ‘Deluding’ Itself on AI Copyright Protection
The Australian Financial Review
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- Date Published
- 21 Sept 2026
- Priority Score
- 3
- Australian
- Yes
- Created
- 21 Sept 2026, 02:00 pm
Description
The former prime minister believes Labor is “edging towards” a model where copyright owners can opt out from having their data used in training.
Summary
Former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull argues that Australia's current copyright protections are ineffective against offshore frontier AI companies that already scrape local content for model training. The Albanese government is reportedly considering easing these restrictions to incentivize companies like OpenAI and Anthropic to invest and train models within Australia. These policy shifts highlight the tension between protecting intellectual property and accelerating the development of domestic frontier AI capabilities, which has long-term implications for national AI governance and safety oversight. The debate underscores a critical junction for Australian policy in balancing economic competitiveness with the regulatory control of advanced AI systems.
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TechnologyCopyrightPrint articleEmma RapaportTechnology reporterSep 21, 2026 – 2.46pmFormer prime minister Malcolm Turnbull says the country is “deluding” itself into thinking strict local copyright laws will protect creators, pointing out that Australian material can already be accessed by offshore frontier artificial intelligence companies to train their models.The comments come as the Albanese government weighs changes to copyright laws to attract OpenAI and Anthropic to train their frontier AI models locally. Scrapping the current prohibition on scraping of copyrighted creative content to train models without permission has been described as a “critical issue” to unlock AI investment in Australia.Loading...SaveLog in or Subscribe to save articleShareCopy linkCopiedEmailLinkedInTwitterFacebookCopy linkCopiedShare via...Gift this articleSubscribe to gift this articleGift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber? LoginLicense articleRead MoreCopyrightLawAIMalcolm TurnbullAnthropicOpenAIALPFetching latest articles