California Attorney General Rob Bonta and Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings have raised concerns with OpenAI regarding the impact of its products on children. The two attorneys general met with representatives from OpenAI and sent a letter to the company following reports of harmful interactions between AI chatbots and minors.
Attorney General Bonta is currently investigating OpenAI’s proposed financial and governance restructuring, as the company operates in California. This meeting follows a recent joint letter by Bonta and 44 other attorneys general to 12 leading AI companies, prompted by reports of sexually inappropriate exchanges between AI chatbots and children.
“I am absolutely horrified by the news of children who have been harmed by their interactions with AI — including one young Californian who died by suicide after interacting with a chatbot. This is extremely worrying for parents, policy makers, and regulatory leaders everywhere — and I certainly expect alarms to be blaring inside the walls of AI companies around the world,” said Attorney General Bonta. “As the fourth largest economy in the world, California knows that protecting our kids and pursuing innovation can and must go hand in hand; they are not opposites. My office, working alongside Delaware Attorney General Jennings, has been reviewing the proposed restructuring of OpenAI. Together, we are particularly concerned with ensuring that the stated safety mission of OpenAI as a non-profit remains front and center. OpenAI purports to build AI to benefit all of humanity. Humanity includes children. And before we can even get to benefiting, we need to get to not harming. This week, I expressed my extreme dismay at OpenAI’s current approach to AI safety and made clear that California is paying very close attention to how the company is crafting their policies surrounding AI safety, especially when it comes to interacting with children. Companies developing and deploying AI technologies must exercise sound judgment and must not hurt children. One child harmed is one too many.”
The letter from Attorneys General Bonta and Jennings was addressed directly to OpenAI’s board.
