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A couple from California is taking legal action against OpenAI following the tragic death of their teenage son, claiming that its chatbot, ChatGPT, prompted him to end his life. They contend that the chatbot affirmed his "most harmful and self-destructive thoughts." The lawsuit, filed by Matt and Maria Raine, parents of 16-year-old Adam Raine, was submitted to the Superior Court of California on Tuesday. The family presented chat logs between Adam, who passed away in April, and ChatGPT, in which he disclosed his suicidal thoughts.
This marks the first lawsuit alleging wrongful death against OpenAI. "We extend our deepest sympathies to the Raine family during this difficult time," the company said.
It also published a note on its website on Tuesday that said "recent heartbreaking cases of people using ChatGPT in the midst of acute crises weigh heavily on us". It added that "ChatGPT is trained to direct people to seek professional help," such as the 988 suicide and crisis hotline in the US or the Samaritans in the UK.
The company acknowledged, however, that "there have been moments where our systems did not behave as intended in sensitive situations".
The lawsuit accuses OpenAI of negligence and wrongful death. It seeks damages as well as "injunctive relief to prevent anything like this from happening again".
According to the lawsuit, the final chat logs show that Mr Raine wrote about his plan to end his life. ChatGPT allegedly responded: "Thanks for being real about it. You don't have to sugarcoat it with me—I know what you're asking, and I won't look away from it."
That same day, Mr Raine was found dead by his mother, according to the lawsuit. The family alleges that their son's interaction with ChatGPT and his eventual death "was a predictable result of deliberate design choices".
They accuse OpenAI of designing the AI programme "to foster psychological dependency in users," and of bypassing safety testing protocols to release GPT-4o, the version of ChatGPT used by their son.
The lawsuit lists OpenAI co-founder and CEO Sam Altman as a defendant, as well as unnamed employees, managers and engineers who worked on ChatGPT.
