On September 19, Bloomberg reported that a key U.S. Republican senator asked OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to submit documents and information about the possible risks ChatGPT poses to children and teenagers, a move that expanded the scope of congressional investigations into AI chatbots.
The inquiry was launched by Republican Senator Josh Hawley. Last month, he first looked into Meta after reports that the company's chatbots could engage in "provocative" interactions with teenagers. But at a Senate hearing on Tuesday, parents of victimized teenagers testified about the harm chatbots are doing to teenagers. Subsequently, Hawley expanded the investigation to include OpenAI, Google, Character.AI, and Snap.
Hawley wrote to OpenAI CEO Altman on Thursday: "More and more evidence shows that AI chatbots pose serious harm to children, and your company's products are responsible for this."
Hawley said in the letter that the company has until October 17 to respond to his list of issues involving OpenAI product development and design and the victimization of teenage users.
As of press time, an OpenAI spokesperson has not commented.