Referral C-829/26 (Mobilguru, 28 Jul 2026)

(1) Must ‘service’, within the meaning of Article 2(a) of the Directive on electronic commerce and Article 1(b) of Directive 2015/1535, be understood to mean solely the mechanisms by which AI models respond to users’ prompts (strict interpretation), or – given that it is the same provider that creates the AI models and provides the service that makes use of them – must that concept also be considered to include the training of the AI [model], that is to say, the activities carried out during its creation (broad interpretation)?

(2) Is it correct to interpret the first subparagraph of Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 as meaning that the right of publishers of press products to authorise and prohibit, in accordance with Article 2 and Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29/EC, the reproduction and the making available of those products to the public ‘on-demand’ is limited exclusively to online use by information society service providers?

If the answer to the preceding question is in the affirmative, is it to be deduced, a contrario, from the first subparagraph of Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 that, in the case of uses which
– are not made by information society service providers, and
– are not made online,
it is not the press publishers, but rather the authors or other holders of related rights, who have the right to authorise and prohibit reproduction and communication to the public ‘on-demand’?

(3) If, depending on the answer to the first question referred, only the response of the AI models to the users’ prompts is to be regarded as constituting an information society service, that is to say, that the restrictive interpretation is the correct one, must Article 15(1) and (3) of Directive 2019/790, as well as Article 5 of Directive 2001/29, to which Article 15(3) and, in particular, Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 refer, be interpreted as meaning that, in the context of the responses of AI services, prohibition or authorisation by press publishers is conceptually excluded in relation to
– the temporary acts of reproduction of a transient or incidental nature described in Article 5(1) of Directive 2001/29, and
– acts of reproduction that are no longer than [individual] words or very short extracts (fourth subparagraph of Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790)
because those acts are regarded as fair dealing?

(4) If, depending on the answer to the first question referred, operations carried out during the training of the AI model are also considered to be an information society service, that is to say, that the broad interpretation is the correct one, must Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 be interpreted as meaning that, in accordance with that article, the right of press publishers to authorise and prohibit the use of their press publications – with the exceptions provided for in Article 15(1) and (3) – also includes acts of reproduction potentially carried out during the training of the AI model?

(5) If text and data mining form part of the training processes for AI chatbots and, in relation to what is set out in the first question referred, the broad interpretation is the correct one, must the activity of text and data mining as a whole be regarded as an information society service, in accordance with Article 4(1) and Article 15(1) [of Directive 2019/790]?

5.1. Given that Articles 3 and 4 of Directive 2019/790 apply to acts of reproduction carried out in the context of text and data mining, how must Article 4(1) be interpreted in relation to the exceptions and limitations to the rights provided for in Article 15(1), to which Article 4(1) refers?

5.1.1. How must the cases of fair dealing provided for in the second, third and fourth subparagraphs of Article 15(1) be interpreted in relation to the activity of text and data mining?

5.1.2. How must Article 15(3) [of Directive 2019/790] and Article 5 of Directive 2001/29, to which reference is made in the former, be interpreted in relation to the activity of text and data mining? How must the rule laid down in Article 5 [of Directive 2001/29], relating to acts of reproduction which are temporary, transient and incidental and which have no independent economic significance, be interpreted in the light of Article 4 [of Directive 2019/790]?

5.1.3. Taking into account the answers to the preceding questions referred, what is the precise extent of the right of publishers of press publications to authorise and prohibit the use of their publications in relation to text and data mining carried out on them? What text and data mining operations are regarded as fair dealing?

5.2. Is it reasonable to differentiate between text and data mining operations carried out during training and when answering questions, in particular in relation to acts of reproduction?

5.3. In answering the preceding questions referred, must importance be attached to the fact that the activity of text and data mining, where it forms part of the training process, constitutes an information society service for the purposes of the first subparagraph of Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 or is that fact entirely irrelevant?

(6) Given that in Article 4(1) of Directive 2019/790 an indirect reference is made, through Article 15(1) of that directive, to Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29, reading those provisions together, how must the primacy of the activity of those making reproductions and extractions for the purposes of text and data mining be interpreted in relation to the right of press publishers to make their publications available ‘on-demand’?

6.1. According to what interpretation is it possible consider that the rights of reproduction and extraction of those carrying out text and data mining may justify limiting the above-described right of press publishers to authorise and prohibit communication to the public to authorising or opposing communication to the public?

(7) If, as indicated in Article 4(1) of Directive 2019/790, press publishers also have the right to authorise the making of their press publications available to the public ‘on-demand’ and that right is able to be limited in order to ensure that the activities of reproduction and extraction for the purposes of text and data mining are regarded as fair dealing, to what extent do the rights conferred on those carrying out text and data mining activities limit the right of press publishers to authorise the making of their press publications available ‘on-demand’? More specifically:

7.1. Does the fair dealing exception for those carrying out text and data mining activities apply solely and exclusively in relation to the authorisation in respect of reproduction and extraction, in accordance with Article 4(1), and that in respect of retention, referred to in Article 4(2).

7.2. In Article 4(1), reference is made, indirectly, through Article 15(1), to Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29, which regulates authorisation to make works available to the public.
To what extent and in what cases is the right of reproduction, extraction and retention for the purposes of text and data mining, which is conferred on organisations carrying out text and data mining activities, able to limit the right of press publishers, given that making available to the public does not appear among the cases of fair dealing mentioned as applying to such organisations?

7.3. In accordance with Article 4(1) of Directive 2019/790, together with the provisions of the directives referred to in that article, including, inter alia, Article 2 of Directive 2001/29 and Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790, and also the reference made in the latter to Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29, must the cases which organisations carrying out text and data mining activities are permitted to regard as fair dealing – reproduction, extraction and retention of data for specific purposes – be interpreted strictly? Is it correct to deduce from that that press publishers are obliged to tolerate

7.3.1. the limitation of their right to authorise reproduction, inasmuch as the activity of text and data mining, both at the training stage and at the functioning stage, entails (or may entail) the reproduction and extraction of parts of a work, albeit temporarily, for the purposes of conversion into tokens?

7.3.2. the limitation of their right to authorise communication to the public, such that, in the absence of an express prohibition, their content (the works) become available to a restricted public formed of those carrying out text and data mining activities?

7.4. Applying an interpretation broader than that referred to in question referred 7.3 and which goes beyond the cases that organisations carrying out the activity of text and data mining are permitted to regard as fair dealing – reproduction, extraction and retention of data for specific purposes – in accordance with Article 4(1) of Directive 2019/790, together with the provisions of the directives referred to in that article, including, inter alia, Article 2 of Directive 2001/29 and Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790, and also the reference made in the latter to Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29, must press publishers be understood to be obliged to tolerate the fact that the AI services operated by those organisations

7.4.1. reproduce their works during training or when providing responses?

7.4.2. communicate their works [to] those carrying out the text and data mining activity during training and to the public formed of users when providing responses?

7.5. How must the cases of fair dealing applicable to acts of text and data mining be interpreted, collectively, in the light of the provisions limiting the rights of press publishers, namely:
– the fourth subparagraph of Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790 (use of individual words or very short extracts);
– Article 5(1) of Directive 2001/29, to which reference is made in Article 15(3) of Directive 2019/790 (acts of reproduction which are transient and temporary and which have no independent economic significance)?

(8) In accordance with Article 4(1) of Directive 2019/790, do persons and organisations carrying out the activity of text and data mining have the right to communicate to the public works contained in a press publication – whether in the context of training or in the context of answering questions – without the specific authorisation of the authors and/or holders of related rights, including press publishers?

8.1. If the answer is in the affirmative, is it necessary to define that public? And, if so, how is it to be defined?

8.2. If the answer is in the negative, must the service provided to internet users by the chatbot operated by the organisations carrying out the text and data mining activity, that is to say, the possible reproduction and communication to the public which takes places in the context of answering questions (which the defendant disputes), be examined taking into consideration or ignoring the content of the abovementioned Article 4.

8.3. Whether the answer is in the affirmative or in the negative, how, collectively, must the provisions of that directive limiting the rights of press publishers, mentioned in question referred 7.5, be interpreted where organisations carrying out the activity of text and data mining communicate works contained in a press publication, or extracts of those works, to the public?

(9) Taking into account Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790, to which reference is made in Article 4(1) of the same directive, as well as Article 2 and Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29, how is the scope of the right of prohibition established in Article 4(3) [of Directive 2019/790] to be interpreted in the light of the following questions?

9.1. Are press publishers able to prevent the use of the works without any limitations, that is to say, are they able to exclude it entirely, or can that exclusion only be applied to cases which go beyond the fair dealing defined in Article 5(1) of Directive 2001/29, to which reference is made in Article 15(1) and (3) [of Directive 2019/790]?

9.2. Is it correct to draw the conclusion set out below from Article 15(1) and Article 4(1) and (3) of Directive 2019/790?
Private or non-commercial use by individual users, acts of hyperlinking and the reproduction and communication to the public of individual words or very short extracts of a press publication, as mentioned in Article 15(1) of Directive 2019/790, constitute fair dealing; that is to say, they cannot be subject to authorisation or prohibition by press publishers. However, if a publisher prohibits the use of the work in the context of fair dealing for the purposes of text and data mining, the undertaking carrying out the text and data mining activity cannot reproduce or copy the work in the context of fair dealing, in accordance with Article 4(1) or Article 15(1) and (3) [of Directive 2019/790].

(10) How must the ‘express reservation’ of the use of the content of press publications be interpreted in the light of Article 4(3) of Directive 2019/790? Does the concept of ‘express reservation’ equate to an express, unconditional and unrestricted prohibition of use, in the sense of excluding the authorisation of any use, in general, of specific content or a specific press product?

10.[1]. Approaching the question referred in point 9.2 from another perspective, in the case of an express reservation made public in an appropriate way and following an appropriate procedure, must Article 4(2) and (3) of Directive 2019/790, together with Article 15(1) of that directive, be interpreted as meaning that reproduction or extraction carried out for the purposes of text and data mining cannot be covered even by the cases of fair dealing provided for in Article 15(1)?

(11) By way of example, do the following constitute an appropriate means of expressing a reservation in relation to the authorisation of reproduction for the purposes of text and data mining, within the meaning of Article 4(3) of Directive 2019/790 and of Article 53(1)(c) of Regulation 2024/1689:
– a reservation expressed in the robots.text file of the internet page of an online press product, prohibiting access to the internet page in a machine-readable manner;
– making public, without recourse to the robots.txt file, but in any other part of the press product itself – whether in the legal information, on the home page of the press product or below the title – that use for the purposes of text and data mining or for other purposes is prohibited?

11.1. When interpreting Article 4(3) of Directive 2019/790, together with Article 53(1)(c) of Regulation 2024/1689 – and in view of enforceability standards – is it reasonable to require press publishers to assert their rights to prohibit or reserve the use of their publications in a way which prevents access to their website, either by using the robots.txt file or by other technical means, and does that constitute an effective and appropriate way of exercising those rights?

11.2. If the answer to the question formulated in point 11.1 is in the negative, is it sufficient for press publishers to make an express declaration prohibiting use and send (communicate) it to its addressee, or make it public in the press product, in a place and manner that are clearly recognisable and accessible for the addressee?

11.3. Is it reasonable, in the context of the effective and appropriate exercise of their rights, to expect press publishers, when choosing the manner in which they declare their reservation of use, to use only the technical solution offered by those carrying out text and data mining activities and which also makes the use of the press product for purposes other than reproduction for the purposes of text and data mining impossible, even if that is not the intention of the publishers?