Florida Asks Court To Impose Restrictions on OpenAI’s ChatGPT Development, Block Children From Using Chatbot

Amid a debate about whether lawmakers should pass legislation to slow down or pause AI development, Florida’s attorney general is asking a court to step in to impose restrictions on OpenAI, calling it deceptive, exploitative, and unreliable.In a video statement posted on X on Monday, Attorney General James Uthmeier announced a new filing asking the Highlands County Circuit Court to issue a temporary injunction to block new AI model development without “independent safety guardrails.” Mr. Uthmeier said the filing comes in response to Open AI’s own push for Congress to impose mandatory safety requirements after a series of mishaps that included models violating their own rules. “They asked the government to tie them to the mast. Well, Florida is answering their cries for help,” the attorney general said. The filing asks the court to order OpenAI to prevent its models, and specifically ChatGPT, from presenting as if they have human characteristics, enticing children to access its chatbot, and creating “tricks designed to keep users talking past the point of danger.”“Stop calling it safe. Stop pretending it’s human. Stop selling it to kids,” Mr. Uthmeier said. “If (OpenAI’s CEO) Sam Altman meant what he said about slowing down, he can join our ask to the court. If he will not, we ask the court to do what OpenAI will not do for itself: protect Florida families.”In a statement, an OpenAI spokesman, Drew Pusateri, said that “governments have an important role to play” in establishing safety standards for AI and said that OpenAI is “committed to working with Florida and other states on advancing pragmatic AI policies that apply to the entire AI industry.”However, Mr. Pusateri told The New York Sun that the company is already working on improving its safety valves. “People want to know AI is being developed safely, and that starts with what companies like ours do ourselves. On Friday, we announced we’ve paused training our most capable models and will resume training only when we are confident that we have additional safeguards in place,” he said.A professor at the University of Texas School of Law, Kevin Frazier, raised doubts that the motion will succeed, telling the Sun that Mr. Uthmeier “documents serious failures” by AI companies to contain their models but he may be over his skis with the filing. The motion “moves too quickly from those failures to predictions of catastrophe” and does not “adequately explain how those predictions will manifest from existing and near-future models.”Mr. Frazier said that Mr. Uthmeier is “rightly concerned” that AI labs are not working with the “level of transparency, independent evaluation, and research warranted by documented instances of uncontrolled AI.” But while the filing cites examples of cyber intrusions and warnings from AI companies about uncontrolled models, it is “short on the evidence” required to “justify such a far-reaching intervention” to restrict development.“This matter is further evidence that while there are no AI exceptions to existing law, applying those laws to the novel, difficult-to-measure risks posed by AI models requires a careful connection between the evidence, the alleged violation, and the relief sought,” he said. Florida’s request comes months after the Sunshine State filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, arguing that the company violated the state’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act by being “grossly negligent in the design, marketing, sale, promotion, and distribution” of its ChatGPT model. The lawsuit alleged that OpenAI released its AI models while withholding information about the potential risks associated with them. The request to limit OpenAI’s model development comes as Florida’s leaders have pushed to restrict AI as the Trump administration has sought to restrict states from imposing limitations. In December, President Trump signed an executive order, directing the Justice Department to sue states over their AI laws. As fears surrounding AI have exploded in recent months amid a near-constant drumbeat of rogue AI models hacking other companies and government websites, and dire warnings from the heads of labs working on developing the technology, Mr. Trump has called apocalyptic fears about AI a “hoax.” Earlier this month, the president said he would create a new “AI Force” to help “cherish” AI and “watch over it as it grows.”Some conservative and libertarian figures have questioned the sudden uptick in warnings about AI, suggesting a hidden motive behind the push for regulation. Billionaire Elon Musk wrote on X that the warnings about AI are part of a “psyop” to push strict regulation that will favor large developers and hinder competition by imposing high compliance costs and making it harder for smaller companies to survive. Meanwhile, Senator Ted Cruz expressed concern that imposing restrictions on AI could give China the “utterly catastrophic” chance to take the lead in developing the technology. However, Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, has urged Republicans not to shy away from AI restrictions. During a September 14 event, Mr. DeSantis reportedly warned that if Florida Republicans run on a policy of “AI amnesty,” it will “hurt them.”Mr. Uthmeier is also pushing for criminal penalties for AI companies when their models are used to break the law, such as helping someone plan a crime.

Florida Asks Court To Impose Restrictions on OpenAI’s ChatGPT Development, Block Children From Using Chatbot

Florida Asks Court To Impose Restrictions on OpenAI’s ChatGPT Development, Block Children From Using Chatbot

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