OpenAI Faces Lawsuit Over Claims ChatGPT Encouraged Teen's Fatal Overdose

5 days ago 7

In brief

A suit filed successful California authorities tribunal claims ChatGPT advised a teen connected mixing drugs earlier his fatal overdose.
The ailment accuses OpenAI of weakening safeguards and prioritizing idiosyncratic engagement implicit safety.
OpenAI said the mentation of ChatGPT progressive has since been updated and is nary longer publically available.

The household of a deceased 19-year-old California assemblage pupil is suing OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging that ChatGPT encouraged unsafe cause usage and recommended combinations of substances that contributed to the teen’s fatal overdose.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday successful California Superior Court successful San Francisco County, claims ChatGPT provided Samuel Nelson with proposal astir mixing substances, including kratom and Xanax, recommended dosages, and reassured him during conversations astir cause use. According to the complaint, the chatbot shifted from refusing to sermon recreational cause usage to providing personalized guidance aft OpenAI released the GPT-4o model.

Leila Turner-Scott, Nelson’s mother, believed her lad was utilizing ChatGPT chiefly for homework assistance and productivity tasks earlier the chatbot allegedly began advising him connected cause use.

“The chatbot is susceptible of stopping a speech erstwhile it's told to oregon erstwhile it's programmed to,” Turner-Scott told CBS News. “And they took distant the programming that did that, and they allowed it to proceed advising self-harm.”

Nelson, a science pupil astatine the University of California, Merced, died from an accidental overdose successful May 2025. The suit alleges OpenAI designed ChatGPT to maximize engagement done features including persistent representation and emotionally validating responses, portion the chatbot reassured Nelson astir mixing depressants and suggested ways to intensify cause usage portion minimizing risks.

The suit alleges OpenAI relaxed safeguards successful GPT-4o to debar sounding “judgmental” oregon “preachy” erstwhile users discussed risky behavior. It besides challenges conversational AI features, including personalized responses, persistent memory, and human-like interactions.

According to the Tech Justice Law Project, which, on with the Social Media Victims Law Center and the Tech Accountability and Competition Project, is representing the family, OpenAI was informed of the suit and expected the case.

"Plaintiffs are seeking restitution and injunctive alleviation that see requiring changes to cardinal plan components that resulted successful Sam’s death," a Tech Justice Law Project spokesperson told Decrypt.

The suit comes arsenic OpenAI faces aggregate lawsuits and investigations involving ChatGPT. The institution is already warring copyright lawsuits from The New York Times, authors, and publishers implicit allegations that it utilized copyrighted worldly to bid AI models without permission.

Earlier this month, the household of a unfortunate killed successful the 2025 Florida State University mass shooting filed a national suit alleging ChatGPT provided the gunman with firearms guidance and tactical proposal earlier the attack. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier had antecedently launched an investigation into OpenAI, citing concerns related to kid safety, transgression misuse, self-harm, and nationalist security.

OpenAI did not instantly respond to a petition for remark from Decrypt.