Florida attorney general issues subpoena in ChatGPT investigation into FSU shooting

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said today that the state has opened a criminal investigation into ChatGPT and its parent company, OpenAI Group PBC, into whether the company is criminally responsible for last year’s shooting at Florida State University.

Last month, Uthmeier announced that his office would open an investigation into OpenAI over a number of concerns including allegations of child abuse, threats to national security, and the shooting in which 20-year-old student Phoenix Ikner killed two people and wounded six others after discussing such crimes with ChatGPT.

Ikner asked a variety of questions to the chatbot, including how the US would respond to the shooting and which parts of the university would be busiest at certain times of the day. Some of the questions were said to be related to advice on weapons and ammunition.

“If this had been the person on the other side of the screen, we would have charged him with murder,” Uthmeier said. “Just because this is a chatbot, an AI, doesn’t mean there’s no evidence of a crime. So, we’re going to look at who knew what, designed what or should have done more.”

Issuing the subpoena to OpenAI is a step up, reportedly in part at the behest of the family of Robert Morales, one of the people who died in the incident. The family’s attorneys said Ikner was “in constant contact with ChatGPT” before he pulled the gun, and that ChatGPT may have “advised” him on “how to commit these horrific crimes.”

“We were looking into the recent FSU shooting, and that shooter’s ChatGPT communication,” Uthmeier said at a press conference this morning. “Our review of those communications revealed that a criminal investigation is warranted.”

Uthmeier’s office will now seek information about OpenAI’s policies and internal training materials and how the company cooperates with law enforcement agencies. The investigation will determine whether “people may have been involved in the creation, management and operation” of ChatGPT in order to “authorize a criminal case.”

An OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement sent to NBC News that the shooting was a tragedy, but ChatGPT is not responsible for this heinous crime. He added that the chatbot only responded to advice found “mainly in public sources on the Internet,” and that it “does not encourage or promote illegal or dangerous activities.”

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