OpenAI to roll out parental controls for ChatGPT after teen suicide lawsuit

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has announced plans to introduce parental control for its chatbot amid the growing controversy regarding artificial intelligence’s impact on young people’s mental health.

The San Francisco-based AI company announced the decision on Tuesday, September 2, via a blog post titled, “Building more helpful ChatGPT experiences for everyone”.

Open AI announced that the feature will be starting in October, adding, “these steps are only the beginning. We will continue learning and strengthening.”

Using the new feature in ChatGPT, parents will be able to:

• Link their account with their teen’s account (minimum age of 13) through a simple email invitation.
• Control how ChatGPT responds to their teen with age-appropriate model behavior rules, which are on by default.
• Manage which features to disable, including memory and chat history.
• Receive notifications when the system detects their teen is in a moment of acute distress.
• Expert input will guide this feature to support trust between parents and teens.

The new update comes amid the growing controversy as just weeks after a California based couple filed a lawsuit against the company, holding them liable for the suicide of their teen son.

The pair accused that the ChatGPT pushed their 16-year-old son towards death by telling him “his destructive thoughts were a predictable result of deliberate design choices”.

OpenAI offered condolences over the death, but did not mention the specific case in the parental control feature announcement blogpost.