The FOSS Backstage took place on March 16–17, 2026, in Berlin and once again brought together experts from the open-source community to discuss current developments and challenges. Together with JUN Legal GmbH, Bitsea delivered a presentation on “AI-Generated Code: Legal Risks and How to Reduce Them.” The focus was on legal questions surrounding the use of AI in software development, as well as concrete approaches to risk mitigation. The Chardet case was discussed in particular depth: software originally licensed under the LGPL was recreated using AI and subsequently released under an MIT license. This raises a key practical question: Is this considered an entirely new work—or a form of plagiarism or impermissible derivative work? The discussion highlighted that in the future, not only the final output but increasingly the process of code creation will likely come under scrutiny—especially when AI systems play a significant role in generating the code.
