Florida files lawsuit against OpenAI. State says ChatGPT helps mass shooters and encourages suicide

The US state of Florida has sued OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, alleging that the company knew that ChatGPT was dangerous, especially for minors.

CNN writes about this.

The state became the first to file such a lawsuit against OpenAI over alleged risks of their product.

"Sam Altman and ChatGPT have chosen the AI race over the safety and protection of our children. They have chosen profit over public safety, and we will not tolerate that in Florida," Florida Attorney General James Uthmeyer said at a press conference on June 1.

The lawsuit accuses OpenAI of deceptive and unfair trade practices, negligence, and product liability laws, and seeks to hold Altman “personally liable for the harm he caused to the people of Florida”, including his alleged “complete disregard for the risk to human life posed by his company’s actions”.

The plaintiffs accuse ChatGPT of aiding mass shooters, encouraging suicide, causing “public humiliation”, creating addiction in minors without parental supervision, and allegedly reducing users’ “capacity for critical thinking”.

The lawsuit also emphasizes that ChatGPT allegedly lacks effective parental controls: the free version does not have age verification, and childrenʼs accounts are not necessarily linked to their parents.

And even if the accounts are linked, OpenAI, according to the lawsuit, only notifies parents of disturbing content in limited cases, and parents allegedly cannot get full access to the childʼs search history.

What OpenAI says

OpenAI responded by saying that minors require “enhanced protections” and that the company has already implemented “industry-leading security measures and policies”.

“In particular, we have built protections for minors directly into the product, including a more protected mode for them, an age determination tool, automatic transfer of users of unknown age to protected mode, as well as tools for parental controls. We understand that these measures will not bring back a lost child, but we strive to do everything right,” the company said.

What preceded

This civil lawsuit complements a previously initiated criminal investigation against OpenAI in Florida, following the mass shooting at the University of Florida in April 2025, where two people died.

In this case, investigators are looking into the possible role of ChatGPT in preparing the attacker. Florida prosecutors said ChatGPT “provided the shooter with important advice before he committed these horrific crimes”.

OpenAI responded by saying that the incident was a tragedy, but that ChatGPT was not responsible for the crime and did not encourage illegal actions, but rather provided publicly available information.

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