OpenAI faces lawsuits over suicides

OpenAI is facing mounting legal troubles after seven families filed lawsuits accusing the company of releasing a dangerously manipulative product that allegedly drove users, including a teenager, to suicide.

- AP

The lawsuits, filed Thursday in California state courts, allege wrongful death, assisted suicide, involuntary manslaughter, and negligence. Filed by the Social Media Victims Law Center and Tech Justice Law Project, the suits claim OpenAI "knowingly released GPT-40 prematurely" despite internal warnings that the model was "dangerously sycophantic and psychologically manipulative."

Four of the alleged victims died by suicide.

One of them, 17-year-old Amaurie Lacey, had turned to ChatGPT for help, according to a lawsuit filed in San Francisco Superior Court. But instead of providing support, the filing claims, "the defective and inherently dangerous ChatGPT product caused addiction, depression, and, eventually, counseled him on the most effective way to tie a noose and how long he would be able to 'live without breathing."