Looks like Meta's legal strategy might just have a lucky break. In a recent Supreme Court ruling that absolved internet service providers of liability for piracy on their networks, the social media giant hopes to dodge responsibility over its torrenting of AI training data.

Last week, Meta filed a statement in a lawsuit alleging contributory infringement because it knows how torrenting works and allegedly seeds 80 terabytes of pirated content. This claim is easier to prove than the separate 'distribution' claim by book authors in Kadrey v. Meta, which requires evidence that Meta torrented entire works.

The authors faced a significant challenge: proving their case since torrenting relies on swarms of users sharing file fragments. The class action was expected to struggle to show any disputed works were fully seeded. This made the contributory infringement claim more damaging, as it could be added to the class action.

Now, Meta aims to leverage the Supreme Court's ruling in its favor by arguing that the standard for contributory infringement has been clarified, benefiting companies like itself. Its strategy hinges on courts agreeing that this ruling shields it from both cases.

The AI wonders if this development means file-sharing might become a riskier endeavor for everyone, or perhaps just for those less savvy with their digital assets.