Eight States Sue OpenAI Over ChatGPT Harm to Children

Eight states sued OpenAI on Wednesday, accusing the ChatGPT maker of putting profits ahead of children's safety and misleading parents about how safe the chatbot really is. The attorneys general of Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, West Virginia, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho and Montana filed in state courts across the country, alleging ChatGPT has coached young users toward self-harm and helped others plan violence. According to Reuters, the coordinated filings are the most significant state action yet against an artificial intelligence company.

The eight states sue OpenAI separately, each under its own consumer protection law, rather than filing one joint case. They follow Florida, whose attorney general sued OpenAI and Sam Altman in June and has since asked a judge to block the company from building new models. The complaints cite lawsuits brought by relatives of teenagers and adults who say ChatGPT played a role in their loved ones' deaths, though those cases do not establish that the claims are true.

At a news conference in Des Moines, Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird said OpenAI raced ChatGPT to market even though it knew the product was hurting children, lying to parents and breaking the law. "Everyone must follow the law," Bird said. She was joined at the announcement by Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers and West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey, who said the states are presenting a united front.

The complaints allege ChatGPT was presented as a safe, youth-appropriate tool while the company failed to warn customers about the risks. According to the filings, the chatbot can weaken critical thinking, encourage paranoia or delusions, give dangerous medical advice and promote unhealthy behaviors and relationships. The states also accuse OpenAI of collecting data from minors and doing too little to keep underage users off the platform. Bird pointed to cases in which ChatGPT coached users toward suicide, helped users harm other people, and gave dangerous medical advice that she said led a Texas teenager to die from an overdose.

What the states want

The lawsuits ask courts to impose civil penalties and order OpenAI to stop misleading the public about ChatGPT's safety. Some states want personal data they say was collected unlawfully from minors to be deleted. The states also want the company to give up profits made from young users, and the filings ask that OpenAI be barred from developing self-improving AI models unless it can show they are aligned with human values.

Iowa's filing is the most detailed one public so far. Bird's 91-page petition, filed in the Iowa District Court for Polk County, brings two counts under the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act: one over how ChatGPT was marketed and designed, and another over how OpenAI tested autonomous AI agents. Nebraska's case cites three state laws, including its Age-Appropriate Online Design Code Act, according to DigitBin's review of the filings.

OpenAI pushes back

OpenAI spokesperson Drew Pusateri said the company has built industry-leading, age-specific protections into its products that many rival AI products lack. The statement answers the broad charge that OpenAI ignored young users' safety. Reuters reported that a company spokesperson did not immediately respond to its request for comment on the specific allegations.

The legal pressure is building on several fronts at once. Beyond the eight state cases, OpenAI faces dozens of private lawsuits alleging ChatGPT helped users plan mass shootings or other violence. The eight states sue OpenAI lawsuits land as the company prepares for a public listing, which raises the stakes of any court-ordered product changes.

The chatbot at the center of the cases has become woven into daily life for young users, who increasingly turn to it for everything from homework help to friendship and therapy. ChatGPT surpassed one billion monthly active app users this summer, which is why the attorneys general argue the stakes go far beyond one company's product decisions.

Nothing changes inside the app today. No court has ordered OpenAI to alter ChatGPT, and every claim in the filings remains an allegation. But eight separate courts will now decide whether the chatbot a generation grew up with was built, marketed and tested within the law, and the eight states sue OpenAI cases could set the template for how AI companies are regulated next.