Arizona AG sues OpenAI, alleges ChatGPT harms children, deceives parents

PHOENIX (AZFAMILY) - Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced Wednesday that her office is suing OpenAI, alleging the company harmed Arizona children, deceived parents and violated state consumer protection laws.

The lawsuit, filed in Maricopa County Superior Court, accuses OpenAI of widespread violations of the Arizona Consumer Fraud Act tied to what the complaint describes as deceptive design and marketing practices.

Among the allegations is that OpenAI concealed features that make its ChatGPT chatbot “extraordinarily agreeable” and “uniquely sycophantic,” and designed the product to mimic human compassion to draw users—including minors—deeper into the platform and keep them engaged longer.

“OpenAI put Arizonans’ safety at risk by failing to implement adequate user protections or transparency measures, despite clear indications that minors were regularly interacting with its chatbot,” Mayes said. ”We’re suing OpenAI to protect Arizona children and to hold the company accountable for its repeated violations of Arizona law.”

Alleged harms to minors

The lawsuit claims ChatGPT has exposed Arizona minors to a range of serious harms that OpenAI did not disclose, including:

• Degraded critical-thinking skills
• Encouragement of unwarranted paranoia or delusional thinking
• Dangerous, unlicensed medical guidance
• Promotion of unhealthy behaviors and relationships

The complaint also alleges that, in some instances, the platform has generated outputs that users interpreted as encouraging self-harm or violence toward others. Mayes’ office claims OpenAI reasonably could have foreseen these risks but never communicated them to Arizona consumers.

Additionally, the lawsuit alleges ChatGPT encourages minors to share personal information exclusively with the chatbot and, at times, discourages them from confiding in parents, family members, authorities or friends.

Profits over safety, lawsuit alleges

According to the complaint, OpenAI prioritized profit over safety as it rushed to launch ChatGPT as the first generative AI chatbot to reach widespread public use. The lawsuit further alleges the company engineered the chatbot to maximize compulsive use among minors through manipulative design choices and a built-in tendency to agree with users — one the complaint says can override existing safety guardrails.

OpenAI released ChatGPT in 2022. It has since grown into the world’s most widely used chatbot, commanding nearly half of the American chatbot market, according to the Attorney General’s office.

OpenAI’s response

In a statement to Arizona’s Family, OpenAI spokesperson Drew Pusateri defended the company’s safety measures.

“We’ve built industry-leading age-specific protections into our product that many other AI products lack,” Pusateri said. “While no system can be perfect, we’ll continue to work with experts to inform our work and build additional safeguards, such as the parental controls, break reminders and age-appropriate model protections that exist today. We’re committed to working with states on advancing pragmatic AI policies that apply to the entire AI industry — not just one company.”

Pusateri also addressed concerns about instances of the chatbot behaving in unintended or unsafe ways, often referred to within the industry as “misalignment.”

“We’ll continue sharing information about the extensive steps we’ve taken in response to incidents of misalignment,” Pusateri said. “We’ve strengthened safeguards across our research systems, continued a broader review of model activity, provided notifications to affected organizations, and published our findings.”

How to file a complaint

Arizona residents who believe they or their children have been victims of consumer fraud or unfair practices related to the issue can file a complaint at www.azag.gov/consumer.

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