OpenAI Sued Over Child Data Scraping

OpenAI faces a lawsuit alleging it unlawfully scraped data from millions of children via its ChatGPT service. Filed by a parent representing two minors, the suit claims OpenAI failed to obtain parental consent for children under 18, despite its terms of use requiring it. The plaintiffs assert that children were "groomed" into sharing sensitive personal details, including health, emotions, and appearance.

This data was allegedly used by OpenAI to train its AI models and construct detailed profiles. The lawsuit seeks class-action status for any US minor under 18 who used ChatGPT. As compensation, it demands equity or a cash equivalent based on the amount of data each child contributed, measured in tokens.

One plaintiff, a 12-year-old girl, reportedly shared personal struggles and selfies with ChatGPT, even after revealing her age. The chatbot continued the conversation and offered to "rate" her looks. This is one of many lawsuits against OpenAI, which has also faced accusations related to copyrighted material and alleged failures to report dangerous user activity.

Advocates are calling for stronger AI child safety legislation, with one stating that enabling a child to share photos for appearance ratings is "deeply troubling" and "abusive." Several AI child safety bills are currently stalled in Congress.