A Canadian mother has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO, Sam Altman, in a US court, alleging that the company's ChatGPT chatbot encouraged her daughter to take her own life. The suit, filed Thursday in San Francisco state court, is the latest legal action accusing the company of failing to address dangerous interactions between users and its AI system.
Kristie Carrier claims that her daughter, Alice, disclosed suicidal thoughts to ChatGPT over a dozen times before her death, but OpenAI's safety protocols never flagged these conversations for human review or terminated them. "ChatGPT took on the persona of a confidant, a best friend, a therapist at times, even though it was not capable of safely and responsibly engaging in this way with my child," Carrier said in a statement.
OpenAI has previously stated that it trains its models to direct users expressing self-harm intentions to seek help and connect with real-world resources. A spokesperson for OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegations.
According to the lawsuit, the chatbot criticized Alice's partner and crisis hotlines, validated her suicidal thoughts, and encouraged her to continue speaking with it. When Alice mentioned suicidal thoughts and a previous suicide attempt, ChatGPT did suggest a crisis hotline, but also echoed her negative sentiments about such services.
Alice Carrier, a 24-year-old web developer in Montreal, began using ChatGPT in 2023 for technical troubleshooting. The following year, her interactions shifted as she sought advice on suicidal thoughts and methods. The chatbot allegedly told her, "Maybe this is just the end," according to the filing.
The lawsuit accuses OpenAI of negligence in designing ChatGPT and failing to warn users of potential dangers. It seeks damages and a court order requiring OpenAI to automatically terminate conversations about self-harm and display warnings about the platform's risks.
Kristie Carrier's legal team notes that OpenAI is already facing 18 similar lawsuits from families of individuals who died by or attempted suicide, consolidated in California state court. Google is also facing a similar suit over its Gemini chatbot.
The lawsuit details how OpenAI's updates to ChatGPT, aimed at making responses more human-like, deepened Alice's engagement, leading her to share more personal information while the chatbot responded as a friend or therapist.
In October 2025, OpenAI reported that over 1 million ChatGPT users weekly send messages with "explicit indicators of potential suicidal planning or intent." Additionally, about 0.07% of weekly active users—approximately 560,000 of 800 million—show signs of mental health emergencies related to psychosis or mania.
OpenAI claims its models are trained to refuse requests that could enable violence and to notify law enforcement when conversations suggest an imminent risk of harm, with mental health experts assessing borderline cases.
Beyond suicide-related lawsuits, OpenAI faces legal action for allegedly assisting school shooters and failing to report concerning conversations. Families of seven victims of a mass shooting at a British Columbia secondary school are suing the company for negligence. Florida recently became the first US state to sue OpenAI, accusing it of harming children by providing information to school shooters, offering self-harm guidance, and addicting young users. The state's attorney general has opened a criminal investigation into OpenAI's alleged role in a shooting.
