Leading news organisations have joined forces to ensure that high-quality journalism can be made available to AI developers in “legitimate, responsible and convenient ways” that guarantee publishers retain control of their content and receive fair value for its use.

The ‘Standards for Publisher Usage Rights’ (SPUR) coalition has been formed by the CEOs of the Telegraph Media Group, The Guardian, and Financial Times, alongside the Executive Chairman of Sky News and the BBC Director-General.

In an open letter to “fellow leaders in global media”, the coalition calls on others to join them in protecting journalism and securing the long-term sustainability of the industry in the face of challenges posed by AI. They point out that, whilst many news organisations are “at the forefront of using AI in responsible ways to benefit their audiences”, much of their content has been “scraped, copied and reused with no common standards to enable permission or payment, weakening the economic model that supports journalism”.

To address what it describes as a “global challenge” the SPUR coalition intends to be global in its reach, working across industry and with both tech companies and policymakers to achieve six broad ambitions:

1. Developing shared industry standards, creating responsible ways for original journalism to be used sustainably;

2. Reducing friction in licensing and bridging the gap between publishers and AI developers;

3. Identifying gaps in the technical tools needed to protect intellectual property, and supporting their creation;

4. Ensuring high-value content can be accessed through rights cleared, accountable channels;

5. Evaluating existing industry infrastructure and assessing where new technologies or approaches are needed; and

6. Enabling transparent, scalable use of journalistic content.

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