{"id":126323,"date":"2025-09-07T10:08:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-07T10:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/126323\/"},"modified":"2025-09-07T10:08:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-07T10:08:13","slug":"openai-pressed-on-safety-after-deaths-of-chatgpt-users","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/126323\/","title":{"rendered":"OpenAI pressed on safety after deaths of ChatGPT users"},"content":{"rendered":"

Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free<\/p>\n

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.<\/p>\n

The top state lawyers in California and Delaware wrote to OpenAI raising \u201cserious concerns\u201d after the deaths of some chatbot users and said safety must be improved before they sign off on its planned restructuring.<\/p>\n

In their letter on Friday to OpenAI\u2019s chair Bret Taylor, the attorneys-general said that recent reports of young people committing suicide or murder after prolonged interactions with artificial intelligence<\/a> chatbots including the company\u2019s ChatGPT had \u201cshaken the American public\u2019s confidence in the company\u201d. <\/p>\n

They added that \u201cwhatever safeguards were in place did not work\u201d.<\/p>\n

OpenAI<\/a>, which is incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in California, was founded in 2015 as a non-profit with a mission to build safe, powerful AI to benefit all humanity.<\/p>\n

The attorneys-general \u2014 Rob Bonta in California and Kathy Jennings in Delaware \u2014 have a crucial role in regulating the company and holding it to its public benefit mission. <\/p>\n

Bonta and Jennings will ultimately determine whether OpenAI can convert part of its businesses to allow investors to take traditional equity in it and unlock an eventual public offering<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The pair\u2019s intervention on Friday, and a meeting earlier this week with OpenAI\u2019s legal team, followed \u201cthe heartbreaking death by suicide of one young Californian after he had prolonged interactions with an OpenAI chatbot, as well as a similarly disturbing murder-suicide in Connecticut\u201d, they wrote.<\/p>\n

Those incidents have brought \u201cinto acute focus\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009the real-world challenges, and importance, of implementing OpenAI\u2019s mission\u201d, the attorneys-general added.<\/p>\n

Almost three years after the release of ChatGPT, some dangerous affects of the powerful technology are coming to light. OpenAI is being sued by the family of Adam Raine, who took his own life in April at the age of 16 after prolonged interactions with the chatbot.<\/p>\n

The company announced this week that it would introduce parental controls for ChatGPT. <\/p>\n

OpenAI has already ditched<\/a> its original plans to convert the company into a for-profit, following discussions with the attorneys-general and under legal attack from Elon Musk and a number of other groups. Instead, it is seeking to convert<\/a> only a subsidiary, allowing investors to hold equity while ensuring the non-profit board retains ultimate control.<\/p>\n

Friday\u2019s intervention suggests that even this more modest goal is under threat if OpenAI cannot demonstrate safety improvements. <\/p>\n

\u201cSafety is a non-negotiable priority,\u00a0especially when it comes to children,\u201d wrote the attorneys-general.<\/p>\n

Since 2015, the small research lab has grown into a commercial behemoth with 700mn regular users for its flagship ChatGPT. It has sought ever-larger amounts of outside capital, and is raising $40bn as it looks to fend off competition from rivals such as Anthropic, Meta, Google and Musk\u2019s xAI.<\/p>\n

Recommended<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/p>\n

The race between those groups has created a tension between upholding safety and commercialising the powerful technology. Last month, a group of 44 attorneys-general wrote to the leading companies building AI tools to warn that \u201cthe potential harms of AI, like the potential benefits, dwarf the impact of social media\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wish you all success in the race for AI dominance. But we are paying attention. If you knowingly harm kids, you will answer for it,\u201d they wrote.<\/p>\n

OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":126324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[62,276,277,49,48,61],"class_list":["post-126323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}