Japanese used bookstores

Japanese secondhand bookstores are reporting roughly fivefold surges in sales as buyers purchase entire stock in bulk, including one order of 50 tons of books shipped to the United States. Observers suspect many of these bulk purchases end up at foreign facilities where books are scanned to train artificial intelligence models and then destroyed, raising concerns in Japan about the loss of printed works.

Used bookstores in Japan are reporting a sharp rise in bulk purchase orders, with roughly 50 tons of books shipped to buyers in the United States, according to Nippon TV. The report highlights growing overseas demand for Japanese-language books, particularly from collectors and readers abroad.