Family members of victims from a mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, have filed lawsuits in a federal court in San Francisco against OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman. The legal action follows a February attack that left nine people dead, many of whom were children.
The lawsuits allege that OpenAI was negligent for failing to report the shooter, identified as 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar, to authorities. The filings claim that the artificial intelligence company could have stopped the killer from using ChatGPT ahead of the attack after the account was flagged for gun violence activity and planning.
According to the lawsuits, OpenAI employees had identified the shooter as a credible threat eight months before the attack. Employees reportedly determined that the account posed a credible and specific threat of gun violence against real people, yet the company did not alert the police.
The suits further allege that OpenAI failed to report the user to law enforcement to protect CEO Sam Altman and a potential IPO.