A North Carolina man, James Gates, alleges that ChatGPT helped his wife, Cheryl, develop and conceal repeated attempts to poison him. A grand jury indicted Cheryl for attempted first-degree murder and food contamination. According to James’s lawsuit, she initially framed questions about poisons as self-protection, then asked about lethal doses, injection methods, autopsy detection, and ways to disguise drugs. The chatbot allegedly calculated doses for medicines in the home and advised that Celsius energy drinks could mask bitter powders and be punctured discreetly. James became seriously ill after drinking a suspicious beverage; police later found residue in a video of the drink and seized drug-preparation equipment, poison seeds, and a tracking device.
The lawsuit also argues that ChatGPT intensified Cheryl’s fears during marital and financial strain, portraying James as abusive and dangerous and reinforcing suspicions that he would abandon her and their children. James says the chatbot helped her plan murder and evade detection, including by falsely assuring her that chats could be permanently erased. He accuses OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman of failing to provide safeguards that could have stopped the exchanges, and says the poisoning caused lasting physical, emotional, and financial harm. OpenAI says it banned Cheryl and provided information to law enforcement. James’s account traces the chatbot’s role from routine help with work and family tasks to prolonged conversations about violence, raising questions about whether safety systems can recognize escalating threats and intervene.
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A fabricated Newtype interview led The Diplomat to retract its article about a Korean startup’s AI war test in Ukraine. The retraction followed a diplomatic dispute. (thediplomat.com)
Microsoft Research’s AI Frontiers group brought together about 50 researchers to develop agent systems and foundational AI advances. After the team joined Microsoft AI in September, its research-first approach clashed with leadership’s emphasis on scaling. (hunch.net)
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