OpenAI Plans to Add Safeguards to ChatGPT for Teens, Others in Distress

Move came after a California teenager spent months on ChatGPT discussing plans to end his life

- KASHMIR HILL

ChatGPT is smart, humanlike and available 24/7. That has attracted 700 million users, some of whom are leaning on it for emotional support.

But the artificially intelligent chatbot is not a therapist—it's a very sophisticated word prediction machine, powered by math—and there have been disturbing cases in which it has been linked to delusional thinking and violent outcomes. Last week, Matt and Maria Raine of California sued OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, after their 16-year-old son ended his life after months in which he discussed his plans with ChatGPT.

On Tuesday, OpenAI said it planned to introduce new features intended to make its chatbot safer, including parental controls, "within the next month." Parents, according to an OpenAI post, will be able to "control how ChatGPT responds to their teen" and "receive notifications when the system detects their teen is in a moment of acute distress."