Third Circuit Hears Oral Argument In Ross v. Reuters AI Training Copyright Case

On June 11, 2026, the Third Circuit heard oral argument in Thomson Reuters Enterprise Centre GmbH et al. v. Ross Intelligence Inc., the first federal appellate case to squarely address whether using copyrighted works to train an AI model qualifies as fair use.¹ The Third Circuit’s ruling on this important question, which is likely to include findings on central questions of transformativeness and market harm discussed during oral argument, is expected in late 2026. The audio recording of the oral argument can be found here.

Background

Ross Intelligence (“Ross”) built an AI-powered search engine, and to do so, created training memos derived from Westlaw's headnotes.² Each memo adapted a headnote into a question paired with multiple answers, which Ross used to train its model.³ Some headnotes were direct quotes from judicial opinions.⁴ Others, however, were not quotes and reflected certain modifications, such as the use of ellipses, the removal of citations, and the condensing of