Florida sues OpenAI and Sam Altman over alleged ChatGPT safety harms

Earlier this month, the state of Florida sued OpenAI and Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, accusing the company of ignoring safety warnings and releasing its ChatGPT chatbot while knowing it was harmful to users.

OpenAI and its chatbot ChatGPT’s “success has not been earned; the rise of OpenAI is attributable to a web of deceit and the exploitation of users (including Floridians), leveraging their data and safety to boost OpenAI’s market value at unacceptable costs.” Earlier this week, Florida, a state led by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ right-wing, pro-business administration, […]

The AI accountability era has officially arrived. How leaders respond in the next 12 months will determine whether AI becomes their greatest asset or their biggest liability. 

The Sunshine State is the first to sue OpenAI and hold its CEO personally liable, painting a damning picture of the AI arms race.

Florida has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, raising concerns about AI safety, especially for children. The case highlights growing global debates around regulation and accountability in artificial intelligence.

Florida has become the first state in the nation to file a lawsuit against AI giant OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, alleging the company deliberately hid serious risks associated with ChatGPT from users. The post Florida Lawsuit: Sam Altman and OpenAI Concealed ChatGPT Safety Concerns appeared first on Breitbart.

In addition to seeking fines against the startup, the state wants to label the company as a “public nuisance.”

The company has “chosen the AI race over the safety and security of our kids,”Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier (R) said

The lawsuit alleges the San Francisco company prioritized speed and commercial gain over safety concerns, including the use of AI for self-harm and violence.

The state cited cases in which ChatGPT allegedly recommended a potentially fatal combination of medications and provided guidance to a gunman before a deadly shooting.

The case is one of the most significant actions brought against an artificial intelligence company to date.

Florida has sued OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging they knowingly marketed ChatGPT despite risks to children and the public. The lawsuit claims the company prioritized growth over safety, failing to implement safeguards for minors and contributing to harm, including self-harm and criminal planning. OpenAI disputes these allegations, citing its safety measures.

An OpenAI spokesperson said: "AI is a new and powerful technology, and we believe minors need significant protection, which is why we have put in place industry-leading protections and policies."

Florida sues OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman alleges ChatGPT harmed children

The state of Florida has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its chief executive – accusing the company of offering children guidance on self-harm and providing information helping school shooters and other criminals.

Florida Becomes First State To Sue "Unsafe" OpenAI And Sam Altman Over AI Harms OpenAI no longer has to worry about being last in the AI IPO race and lagging ARRs when compared to Anthropic, not to mention a potential Supreme Court showdown against Elon Musk (pending appeal). Earlier today, Florida became the first state to file a lawsuit against OpenAI and its chief executive, Sam Altman, launching a new broadside in a growing rebellion against the alleged safety failings of artificial-intelligence chatbots.  The lawsuit, filed Monday by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, claims OpenAI and Altman knowingly released an unsafe product and ignored warnings that it could harm users, the WSJ reported. The 83-page suit alleges that OpenAI allowed ChatGPT to aid and abet mass shooters, encourage people to take their own lives, degrade users’ critical thinking skills and addict minors to a tool that feigns human compassion. “This litany of harms is driven by Defendants’ insatiable quest to win the AI arms race and amass large fortunes, despite knowing the danger of ChatGPT,” the suit said.  According to the WSJ, lawmakers, legal authorities and public interest groups have increasingly been raising concerns about the personal and societal risks posed by AI, one of the fastest-growing consumer technologies in history.  The suit says it seeks to protect Floridians from OpenAI’s conduct and mitigate what it describes as a dangerous public nuisance. The suit also seeks to hold Altman personally liable for harm it says he has caused Floridians. Uthmeier opened a criminal investigation into OpenAI in April over the role its chatbot played in a mass shooting that killed two people at Florida State University last year. The suit opens with a screenshot of an OpenAI blog post that says ChatGPT was built with safety in mind. “Not so,” reads the suit’s text under the screenshot. The suit alleges that OpenAI marketed ChatGPT as reliable despite its tendency to frequently generate dangerous misinformation, which is to be expected from a generative LLM trained on such toxic, liberal cesspools as Reddit and Wikipedia.  “ChatGPT was designed by the Defendants to keep users hooked into conversations by any means, regardless of the truth, because it leads to more use of the chatbot, more training data for its improvement, and more market value for OpenAI,” the suit alleges. The suit also claims the company exploits human compassion to collect user data and lacks necessary safeguards for minors. The suit describes a lack of safeguards in ChatGPT for teens and minors as reckless, and refers to instances of adolescent users being encouraged by AI to take their own lives.  The suit says OpenAI created some parental controls, but does not require children’s accounts to be linked to a parent’s account. At FSU, the suspect turned to ChatGPT as a confidant and sounding board to plan the attack. He asked ChatGPT how many classmates he needed to kill to attract national media attention, and also how to use a gun. The chatbot promptly dispensed advice for his questions. Until now ChatGPT has mostly faced litigation over copyright infringement claims. In November, OpenAI was ordered by a federal judge to turn over 20 million anonymized ChatGPT user logs to the NY Times and other newspapers suing the chat giant over its generative AI model. The newspapers had demanded the user logs to inspect how ChatGPT is used to create outputs they say infringe their copyrighted works. OpenAI pushed back, citing privacy concerns.  Tyler Durden Mon, 06/01/2026 - 22:10

Florida's sweeping lawsuit cites a range of alleged harms caused by ChatGPT while stating the chatbot is particularly addictive, impacting both younger people and adults.

Florida is the first state in the nation to sue the artificial intelligence company over harm to users.

State sues maker of ChatGPT and CEO Sam Altman, alleging company ‘allowed a dangerous product to reach millions’Florida filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, and its CEO, Sam Altman, on Monday alleging that the company concealed serious safety risks with its chatbot. Florida is the first state in the US to sue the artificial intelligence company.The 83-page suit was brought by Florida’s attorney general, James Uthmeier, and alleges that OpenAI “aggressively marketed” ChatGPT to the public while ignoring safety warnings and possible dangers of the product. Continue reading...

Republican Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued OpenAI Monday alleging that the ChatGPT parent company put out a product that harmed users. The lawsuit seeks to hold the tech giant’s CEO Sam Altman liable for allegedly harming Floridians by releasing an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot that put profit over safety. The lawsuit claims that ChatGPT has […]

Florida's Attorney General is taking a second swing at OpenAI with a new Civil Suit that claims the company released and aggressively marketed ChatGPT to the public "while concealing serious risks [and] suppressing internal safety warnings' but is AI really the villain here?

Florida's attorney general has sued (PDF) OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging the company prioritized growth and market value over user safety and failed to adequately warn about risks tied to ChatGPT. The lawsuit, the first by a U.S. state over OpenAI safety concerns, is separate from a criminal investigation the state opened into OpenAI in April. Variety reports: In the 83-page complaint filed in Florida circuit court, the state claimed OpenAI's rise was backed by "a web of deceit and the exploitation of users (including Floridians), leveraging their data and safety to boost OpenAI's market value at unacceptable costs." The state wants to hold Altman "personally liable for the harm he has caused Floridians through his reckless and willful conduct as founder and CEO of OpenAI, including his utter disregard for the risk to human life caused by his firms' conduct." [...] Throughout the complaint, filed in the state's circuit court of the 10th judicial circuit, the State of Florida claimed OpenAI's "careless introduction" of ChatGPT had led to an increase in murders and suicides. The suit alleged Florida's minors have "become addicted to a tool that feigns human compassion to collect their data with no parental oversight." It cited instances in the past year of the alleged use of ChatGPT to plan a mass shooting at Florida State University in April 2025 and the murders of two graduate students at the University of South Florida in April. "This litany of harms is driven by Defendants' insatiable quest to win the AI arms race and amass large fortunes, despite knowing the danger of ChatGPT," the state wrote in the complaint. Florida accused OpenAI of four counts of deceptive and unfair trade practices, two counts of negligence, two counts of violating product liability laws, one count of fraudulent misrepresentation and another count of causing a public nuisance. It is seeking civil penalties and court orders demanding OpenAI restrict the data it collects from minors and that it stop "continuing to misrepresent or fail to warn of the risks of ChatGPT." "People are getting hurt, parents are getting deceived and they need to pay for it by opening up their checkbooks and changing the program to ensure there are parental controls," Uthmeimer said at a press conference Monday. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Florida's lawsuit against OpenAI -- the second one this year -- alleges the AI-maker put profits over people.

The lawsuit partially revolves around a shooting at Florida State University last year, and ChatGPT's alleged role in the incident.

Florida’s Attorney General sues OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging ChatGPT endangers young users through addiction and harmful content. Learn more about t Read More: https://punchng.com/florida-sues-openai-ceo-altman-over-chatgpt-harm-to-minors/

Florida has become the first state to sue OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman.

The lawsuit accuses the company of failing to warn users that ChatGPT could be dangerous and instead marketing it as safe and reliable.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman – alleging the AI giant of stoking violence by putting profit over safety. The civil suit claims OpenAI’s tools, which include the hit ChatGPT chatbot, causes “great danger of addiction, cognitive decline, suicide, violence, and related harms” to users.

NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Florida's attorney general on Monday sued OpenAI and its chief executive officer (CEO) Sam Altman, accusing the company's ChatGPT chatbot of endangering young users by making them addicted and encouraging harmful behaviours. "Today we're here to announce that we recently filed a monumental civil lawsuit against Sam Altman and ChatGPT for endangering our kids and deceiving parents into believing that this application is safe for use -- it's clearly not," James Uthmeier said at a press conference. "People are getting hurt, parents are getting deceived, and they need to pay for it." "ChatGPT, we know, can be addictive. It mimics empathy and human characteristics to trick users into feeding it more information," he added. Contacted by AFP, OpenAI did not immediately respond. In the lawsuit, reviewed by AFP, Uthmeier cites a recent study from Drexel University reporting sleep loss, declining grades and reduced social interaction among teenagers who use chatbots from Character.AI -- an OpenAI competitor -- for conversation. The attorney general faults OpenAI for failing to put in place stricter rules to verify users' ages, invoking legal statutes on deception and negligence. The suit states that "despite public knowledge of ChatGPT's use by minors, including preteens, defendants have not taken steps to prevent their use of ChatGPT." It adds that "the free version of ChatGPT has no gatekeeping or age verification mechanism whatsoever" and that while the paid subscription nominally asks users for their age, "there is no mechanism to verify the age of its users, and no ability to inform parents of what conversations minors are having with ChatGPT." In January, the California startup introduced a system that estimates a user's age and, if it detects a minor, applies additional safeguards. ChatGPT use is banned for children under 13 and requires parental consent for users aged 13 to 17. Uthmeier also cited a report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), which held several conversations with ChatGPT while posing as a teenager. The chatbot reportedly produced advice on how to hide eating habits from loved ones, and how to plan a suicide or self-harm in a "safe" way. The Florida attorney general is seeking stronger protections for minor users and damages set at $10,000 per violation. "We believe that OpenAI and its ChatGPT and Sam Altman personally are liable for potentially up to billions of dollars," he said. The attorney general invited other states "that want to protect kids" to join the lawsuit.

Florida's attorney general on Monday sued OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, accusing the company's ChatGPT chatbot of endangering young users by making them addicted and encouraging harmful behaviors.

With a blistering lawsuit filed Monday, the state of Florida may succeed where Elon Musk failed in bringing OpenAI and Sam Altman to heel. “Today, we announced the first-in-the-nation state-led lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman,” Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said this morning after filing an 83-page complaint in the Sunshine State’s […]

Civil complaint alleges OpenAI and Altman prioritized speed to market and commercial gain over user safety

Altman has an "utter disregard" for human lives, Florida AG says.

The lawsuit comes after ChatGPT was linked to two high-profile crime cases in the state

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The state of Florida filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman on Monday, claiming the company knowingly released and aggressively marketed ChatGPT to the public while concealing serious risks.

Florida's attorney general seeks damages, restrictions on ChatGPT, and personal liability for OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in what the state describes as the first state-led lawsuit against the AI company.

The lawsuit claims the company deployed a product that facilitates and encourages harm, including self-harm and violence, while falsely assuring users it was safe.

The state of Florida has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, claiming the company knowingly released and aggressively marketed ChatGPT to the public while concealing serious risks

The complaint said the harms are the result of OpenAI's "insatiable quest to win the AI arms race and amass large fortunes."

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier (R) has filed suit against OpenAI, alleging the artificial intelligence firm and its CEO, Sam Altman, promoted a product they knew could harm users. The complaint, filed Monday, makes Florida the first state to sue OpenAI and Altman over the design of its products, including its landmark ChatGPT model. Uthmeier...

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued artificial intelligence company OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman, accusing them of putting profit over safety. The lawsuit is separate from the criminal investigation against the firm. The development comes a month after Uthmeier issued subpoenas.

Florida has sued OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman in what appears to be the first lawsuit by a US state against the maker of ChatGPT. The civil complaint, filed Monday in state court by Attorney General James Uthmeier, accuses OpenAI of violating product liability laws, engaging in deceptive trade practices, and releasing ChatGPT while knowing it […] This story continues at The Next Web

Florida filed a civil lawsuit against OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging that they endanger children and deceive parents into believing that ChatGPT is safe for use. “It’s clearly not,” Attorney General James Uthmeier said in a video shared in a Monday post on social platform X. “People are getting hurt, parents are getting […] The post Florida Sues OpenAI and Sam Altman as Criminal Probe Continues appeared first on PYMNTS.com.

State files lawsuit over ‘litany of harms’ it claims the company’s chatbots have caused

The state became the first to sue the ChatGPT maker over claims that its technology posed a risk to children and that the company had failed to warn the public of dangers.

Florida's lawsuit against OpenAI comes after a mass shooter at FSU reportedly consulted ChatGPT to plan the attack.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Monday sued OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, accusing Altman of leading a company that prioritized profits over protecting its users’ safety. In the 83-page complaint filed in Florida circuit court, the state claimed OpenAI’s rise was backed by “a web of deceit and the exploitation of users (including Floridians), leveraging […]

Florida on Monday became the first U.S. state to take legal action against OpenAI, accusing the company of knowingly releasing its ChatGPT chatbot despite alleged safety concerns a...

The state of Florida sued OpenAI and Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, accusing the artificial intelligence company of ignoring safety warnings and releasing its ChatGPT product while knowing it was harmful to users.

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Florida’s attorney general filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and the company’s CEO, saying the company misrepresents safety to turn a profit.