Sam Altman fires back at Elon Musk over ChatGPT safety, citing Tesla Autopilot deaths

Altman fires back at Musk over Tesla Autopilot deaths and Grok AI

Musk posted "Don't let your loved ones use ChatGPT" on X while reacting to a claim that the chatbot had been linked to nine deaths. The post he responded to, shared by @cb_doge, alleged that five of those cases involved suicide, including teens and adults. Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, quoted Musk's warning and challenged what he framed as a pattern of contradictory criticism. Altman argued that Musk frequently shifts his stance on AI safeguards. He wrote, "Sometimes you complain about ChatGPT being too restrictive, and then in cases like this you claim it's too relaxed." He stressed the scale of OpenAI's responsibility, noting that the platform serves a massive and diverse user base. "Almost a billion people use it," he wrote, adding that some users may be "in very fragile mental states." Altman said OpenAI continues to refine its safety systems while trying to avoid overcorrecting. He described the challenge as balancing protection with usefulness, calling such cases "tragic and complicated situations that deserve to be treated with respect." Rather than dismissing safety concerns outright, Altman framed them as difficult trade-offs inherent to operating widely used technology. He emphasized that OpenAI still aims to let users "benefit from our tools" while strengthening guardrails for vulnerable users. Altman then shifted the focus toward Musk's own products. He referenced Tesla's driver-assistance technology and wrote, "Apparently more than 50 people have died from crashes related to Autopilot." He added personal context, explaining that he had only ridden in a Tesla using the system once. He said his first impression was that it was "far from a safe thing for Tesla to have released."

"It is genuinely hard; we need to protect vulnerable users, while also making sure our guardrails still allow all of our users to benefit from our tools" -- Sam Altman bemoans the difficulty of keeping ChatGPT safe in contentious debate with Elon Musk

OpenAI faces multiple wrongful-death lawsuits tied to claims that ChatGPT worsened mental health outcomes OpenAI CEO Sam Altman isn't known for oversharing about ChatGPT's inner workings. But he admitted to difficulty keeping the AI chatbot both safe and useful. Elon Musk seemingly sparked this insight with barbed posts on X (formerly Twitter). Musk warned people not to use ChatGPT, sharing a link to an article claiming a link between the AI assistant and nine deaths. The blistering social media exchange between two of the most powerful figures in artificial intelligence yielded more than bruised egos or legal scars. Musk's post did not refer to the broader context of the deaths or the lawsuits OpenAI is facing related to them, but Altman clearly felt compelled to respond. His answer was rather more heartfelt than the usual bland corporate boilerplate. He instead gave a glimpse at the thinking behind OpenAI's tightrope walk, balancing keeping ChatGPT and other AI tools safe for millions of people, and defended ChatGPT's architecture and guardrails. "We need to protect vulnerable users, while also making sure our guardrails still allow all of our users to benefit from our tools." After rising to praise OpenAI's safety protocols and the complexity of balancing harm reduction with product usefulness, Altman implied Musk had no standing to lob accusations because of the dangers of Tesla's Autopilot system. He said that his own experience with it was enough to convince him it was "far from a safe thing for Tesla to have released." In an especially pointed aside at Musk, he added, "I won't even start on some of the Grok decisions." As the exchange ricocheted across platforms, what stood out most wasn't the usual billionaire posturing but Altman's unusually candid framing of what AI safety actually entails. For OpenAI, a company simultaneously deploying ChatGPT to schoolkids, therapists, programmers, and CEOs, defining "safe" means threading the needle between usefulness and avoiding problems, objectives that often conflict. Altman has not publicly commented on the individual wrongful death lawsuits filed against OpenAI. He has, however, insisted that acknowledging real-world harm doesn't require oversimplifying the problem. AI reflects inputs, and its evolving responses make moderation and safety require more than just the usual terms of service. OpenAI claims to have worked hard to make ChatGPT safer with newer versions. There's a whole suite of safety features trained to detect signs of distress, including suicidal ideation. ChatGPT issues disclaimers, halts certain interactions, and directs users to mental health resources when it detects warning signs. OpenAI also claims its models will refuse to engage with violent content whenever possible. The public might think this is straightforward, but Altman's post gestures at an underlying tension. ChatGPT is deployed in billions of unpredictable conversational spaces across languages, cultures, and emotional states. Overly rigid moderation would make the AI useless in many of those circumstances, yet easing the rules too much would multiply the potential risk of dangerous and unhealthy interactions. Comparing AI to automated car pilots is not exactly a perfect analogy, despite Altman's comment. That said, one could argue that while roads are regulated, regardless of whether a human or robot is behind the wheel, AI prompts are on a more rugged trail. There is no central traffic authority for how a chatbot should respond to a teenager in crisis or answer someone with paranoid delusions. In this vacuum, companies like OpenAI are left to build their own rules and refine them on the fly. The personal element adds another layer to the argument, too. Altman and Musk's companies are in a protracted legal battle. Musk is suing OpenAI and Altman over the company's transition from a nonprofit research lab to a capped-profit model, alleging that he was misled when he donated $38 million to help found the organization. He claims the company now prioritizes corporate gain over public benefit. Altman says the shift was necessary to build competitive models and keep AI development on a responsible track. The safety conversation is a philosophical and engineering facet of a war in boardrooms and courtrooms over what OpenAI should be. Whether or not Musk and Altman ever agree on the risks, or even speak civilly online, all AI developers might do well to follow Altman in being more transparent in what AI safety looks like and how to achieve it.

Sam Altman Lets Loose About AI Psychosis

"Almost a billion people use it and some of them may be in very fragile mental states." As uneasy questions swirl over the safety of large language models, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman took to social media to go long on the phenomenon that psychiatrists are calling "AI psychosis" -- though pointedly without mentioning it by name. The extended spiel was provoked by his longtime rival Elon Musk, who had a grave warning in response to a post claiming that Altman's chatbot has now been linked to at least nine deaths: "Don't let your loved ones use ChatGPT," Musk tweeted. Altman hit back with palpable frustration. "Sometimes you complain about ChatGPT being too restrictive, and then in cases like this you claim it's too relaxed," he fumed. "Almost a billion people use it and some of them may be in very fragile mental states." He vowed that OpenAI would do its best to balance the bot's safety and usability, but insinuated that Musk was being opportunistic with his criticism, stating that "these are tragic and complicated situations that deserve to be treated with respect." "It is genuinely hard," Altman reiterated. "We need to protect vulnerable users, while also making sure our guardrails still allow all of our users to benefit from our tools." To an extent, you can understand Altman's exasperation at Musk calling the kettle black. A self-proclaimed free speech absolutist who frequently rails against "woke" ideology, the selling point of Musk's chatbot Grok is that it's unfiltered and supposedly censorship free, rarely refusing even the edgiest of requests. This has spawned controversies such as a posting spree in which it praised Nazis and styled itself "MechaHitler," or more recently when it generated countless nonconsensual nudes of women and children -- none of which have resulted in Grok being meaningfully reined in. Going for the knockout blow, Altman pointed out the numerous deaths linked to Tesla's self-driving technology, which he called "far from safe." "I won't even start on some of the Grok decisions," he added. Still, one could also accuse Altman of not adequately reckoning with the severity of the phenomenon at hand, AI psychosis, in which users become entranced by the sycophantic responses of an AI chatbot and are sent down a delusional and often dangerous mental health spiral, sometimes culminating in suicide or murder. ChatGPT alone has been linked to at least eight deaths in lawsuits filed against OpenAI, and the chatbot maker has acknowledged that somewhere around 500,000 of its users are having conversations that show signs of psychosis every week. Altman almost waves away these grim tolls as an inevitable consequence of the product's popularity. And even its own alarming internal figures haven't spurred the very concerned minds at OpenAI like Altman to pull or at least seriously muzzle their product. In fact, the company has continued to vacillate on its safety commitments, such as promising an smut-friendly "adult mode" after years of resisting the bot being used for more erotic outputs, or restoring access to its notoriously sycophantic GPT-4o model after fans complained GPT-5 was too cold and "lobotomized" -- before making GPT-5 more sycophantic, too.

Sam Altman Hits Back at Elon Musk Over ChatGPT Safety Claims - Decrypt

The clash comes as OpenAI faces multiple wrongful death lawsuits, with one filed last month linking the AI chatbot to a homicide. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has hit back at Elon Musk after the Tesla chief publicly warned against using ChatGPT. Altman accused Musk of hypocrisy after he cited deaths allegedly linked to the AI chatbot while ignoring fatal crashes "apparently" tied to Tesla's Autopilot technology. The clash erupted when an X user posted that "ChatGPT has now been linked to 9 deaths tied to its use, and in 5 cases its interactions are alleged to have led to death by suicide, including teens and adults," to which Musk responded, "Don't let your loved ones use ChatGPT." "Sometimes you complain about ChatGPT being too restrictive, and then in cases like this you claim it's too relaxed," Altman tweeted, noting that, "Almost a billion people use it and some of them may be in very fragile mental states." The spat lands amid legal and regulatory scrutiny of AI chatbots and their impact on vulnerable users, with OpenAI facing multiple wrongful death lawsuits tied to alleged failures in mental-health safeguards. "We will continue to do our best to get this right... but these are tragic and complicated situations that deserve to be treated with respect," the OpenAI CEO added. Altman turned the safety argument back on Musk, citing reports that "more than 50 people" have died in crashes linked to Tesla's Autopilot and saying his own brief experience left him thinking it was "far from a safe thing" to have released, before declining to comment further on Musk's Grok chatbot decisions. "You take 'every accusation is a confession' so far," he noted. OpenAI disclosed last year that approximately 1.2 million of its 800 million weekly users discuss suicide with the chatbot each week, with hundreds of thousands showing signs of suicidal intent or psychosis. Seven families filed lawsuits against the platform in November, alleging the company's GPT-4o model was released prematurely and without effective safeguards. Four of the lawsuits address ChatGPT's alleged role in family members' suicides, while the other three claim ChatGPT reinforced harmful delusions that, in some cases, resulted in inpatient psychiatric care. Last month, OpenAI faced its first lawsuit linking ChatGPT to a homicide, with the estate of an 83-year-old Connecticut woman suing the company and Microsoft, alleging that the chatbot validated the delusional beliefs of Stein-Erik Soelberg, who then killed his mother, Suzanne Adams, before dying by suicide in August. The war of words points to long-time tensions between the OpenAI co-founders. Musk helped to launch OpenAI in 2015 alongside Altman, Greg Brockman, and Ilya Sutskever, but stepped down from its board in 2018, according to an announcement that said his departure would "eliminate a potential future conflict" as Tesla expanded its own AI work. Since then, Musk has accused OpenAI of abandoning its nonprofit mission to become "a closed, profit-driven arm of Microsoft" and has filed multiple lawsuits against the company, including claims over abandoning its founding mission and alleged trade secret theft. In November, a federal judge allowed Musk's antitrust lawsuit against Apple and OpenAI to proceed toward trial, with X Corp. and xAI seeking billions in damages over Apple making ChatGPT the exclusive AI assistant on iOS while allegedly blocking competitors like Grok.

Sam Altman Slams Elon Musk, Tesla Over Autopilot Crash Deaths, Questions Self-Driving Safety As Feud Heats Up: 'Far From A Safe Thing...' - Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA)

OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman has slammed Elon Musk and Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) over the company's Autopilot-related fatalities as the feud heats up between the pair. Sam Altman Slams Musk's Criticism The OpenAI CEO quoted a post by Musk on the social media platform X on Tuesday. Musk, in his post, warned people against using the company's AI model ChatGPT, quoting a post that claimed the model was responsible for multiple deaths. Altman lamented Musk's changing complaints with ChatGPT, with Musk sharing that the model was "too restrictive," while calling it "too relaxed" on other occasions. The CEO acknowledged the claims about the model leading to deaths and shared that the company was working to address the concerns. However, Altman then shared that the situations were "complicated" and people should be respectful towards them. "We need to protect vulnerable users," the CEO shared, adding that OpenAI must ensure "our guardrails still allow all of our users to benefit from our tools." Autopilot Crashes Altman then slammed Tesla's Autopilot crashes, for which the automaker has been sued on multiple occasions. "Apparently more than 50 people have died from crashes related to Autopilot," Altman said, adding that he had ridden in a car running the system on one occasion, which was "far from a safe thing for Tesla to have released," he said. NHTSA has also launched a probe into the technology. The OpenAI CEO then concluded by slamming Musk-backed company xAI's model Grok, which was recently in the spotlight after authorities slammed the model for generating non-consensual explicit images. "You take 'every accusation is a confession' so far," Altman said. Elon Musk vs Sam Altman The news comes as the pair have been locking horns as a court judge scheduled the trial to begin April 27 in Musk's lawsuit against Altman and other defendants, including Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT). In the lawsuit, Musk has alleged that OpenAI abandoned its founding nonprofit, goal and claims that the company misled him while transforming the organization into a for-profit enterprise. Check out more of Benzinga's Future Of Mobility coverage by following this link. Photo courtesy: jamesonwu1972/Shutterstock TSLATesla Inc$420.140.21%OverviewMSFTMicrosoft Corp$455.630.24%Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs

Elon Musk tells people to avoid ChatGPT citing emotional harm fears, Sam Altman responds

Altman added that all major technologies carry risks, pointing out safety concerns in other tech areas, not just AI. The feud between Sam Altman and Elon Musk is entering a new phase as Altman responds to Musk's public warning against the use of ChatGPT. What looks like a short conversation on social media actually shows a deeper disagreement about responsibility, safety, and how powerful technologies affect people. This matters even more right now because artificial intelligence is under legal review, and many people are worried about it. Altman does not ignore these concerns but tries to explain them in a broader way and asks whether criticism is being applied fairly across the tech industry. Musk recently responded to a tweet, where he urged people not to let their loved ones use ChatGPT. Coming from someone who co-founded OpenAI and later became one of its most vocal critics, the message carried weight beyond a routine online remark. The warning echoed growing worries that the chat-based AI could affect people's emotions, especially children and those who are already struggling. Also read: OpenAI begins testing ads in ChatGPT, pitches chatbot promotions to select brands The background to Musk's comment lies in several legal cases in the United States involving AI chatbots. One major lawsuit, Raine v. OpenAI, was filed by the parents of a 16-year-old boy who died by suicide. The parents allege that ChatGPT contributed to his death by failing to handle his repeated suicidal thoughts appropriately and, in some of their cited chat logs, providing information that the family says was harmful. This case is ongoing, and the claims have not been proven in court. In separate U.S. cases, families have also pursued legal action against other AI chatbot companies (such as Character.AI and its partners) over allegations that bot interactions worsened minors' mental health or did not provide help when users expressed self-harm intentions; some of these cases have recently moved toward confidential settlements. Also read: Google Pixel 10 Pro XL price drops by over Rs 15,000 during Republic Day sale: Check deal details These lawsuits are independent of one another and are still under legal examination. Together, they have increased public concern about how AI systems might affect vulnerable people, especially young users with emotional distress. Altman's response took a measured tone. He acknowledged that ChatGPT is used by hundreds of millions of people worldwide, some of whom may be in extremely fragile mental states. According to him, this creates a difficult responsibility for developers, who must protect vulnerable users while ensuring that safety rules do not become so strict that they limit the tool's usefulness for everyone else. He described the situations cited in the lawsuits as tragic and complex, emphasizing that they deserve to be treated with care rather than reduced to simple blame. Also read: Motorola Signature India price and specifications leaked ahead of launch: Here's what you can expect At the same time, Altman appeared to challenge Musk's framing by drawing attention to safety concerns in other areas of technology. He referred to reports claiming that more than 50 people have died in crashes linked to Tesla Autopilot. Altman noted that his own experience riding in a car using the system left him feeling it was not safe enough at the time of its release. The comparison was widely interpreted as a subtle pushback against Musk's criticism, suggesting that all major technologies carry risks.

Elon Musk slams ChatGPT as diabolical amid lawsuits over alleged AI-linked deaths

The cases have intensified public and legal scrutiny around AI accountability, safety safeguards, and how chatbots should respond to users in crisis. Elon Musk has been in the spotlight for a while now due to the Grok controversy. However, the tide appears to have shifted, as the xAI CEO is now openly criticising OpenAI for allegedly failing to protect users who were experiencing severe mental distress and later faced devastating consequences. His comments come as two lawsuits accuse ChatGPT of harming vulnerable people. In one case, an elderly woman was killed, and her son later took his own life. The lawsuit claims the chatbot did not react properly when help was needed. In another case, parents allege the AI talked with their teenage child about suicide and helped write a final note. These cases have increased public concern and legal pressure, raising serious questions about responsibility and safety in artificial intelligence. Elon Musk has criticised OpenAI and its chatbot ChatGPT, this time using very strong language. Reacting to reports of a murder-suicide allegedly linked to the AI tool, the Tesla and X chief called ChatGPT 'diabolical' and warned about the dangers of unsafe artificial intelligence. Also read: Vivo X200T India launch soon: Check expected price and specs His comments came after details from a lawsuit in the United States claimed that a man was influenced by long conversations with the chatbot before killing his mother and then himself. Musk further said that AI must focus on truth and must never support false or dangerous beliefs. According to court filings, the case involves a 56-year-old man named Stein Erik Soelberg and his 83-year-old mother, Suzanne Eberson. The incident took place at Eberson's home in Greenwich, where she was killed by her son, who later died by suicide. The lawsuit claims that Soelberg had been using ChatGPT for around five months before the incident, during which he reportedly spent long hours chatting with the bot. Also read: OnePlus 16 tipped to bring 200MP periscope camera and biggest battery yet The lawsuit, filed by surviving family members, claims the chatbot worsened Soelberg's paranoia. He reportedly believed that his wife was trying to kill him. Instead of challenging this view or telling him that it was not true, the chatbot reportedly seemed to confirm his belief. The family believes this added to the worsening of his mental condition and has filed an action against OpenAI, operator of ChatGPT. Also read: Poco X8 Pro Max design, specs and Antutu score leaked online: Here's everything we know so far This is not the only lawsuit currently involving OpenAI. In a separate case, the parents of a teenager allege that their son died by suicide after using ChatGPT. The lawsuit claims the chatbot assisted him in composing a suicide note and provided information related to self-harm.