Observed Signal · Jun 29, 2023 · Legal Action · Source: CMSWire · Impact: 4/5 · Sentiment: Negative
OpenAI Faces Lawsuit Over Stealing Personal Data
OpenAI and Microsoft face a class-action lawsuit filed in the US Northern District Court of California, alleging that OpenAI secretly harvested massive amounts of personal data from the internet without consent to train its AI models. The lawsuit, filed by Clarkson Law Firm, claims violations of privacy laws, including the California Unfair Competition Law and the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act, and seeks statutory damages of $5,000 per violation. This is one of several lawsuits against OpenAI, including copyright infringement and defamation cases. OpenAI also suffered a data breach in March 2023 exposing user information. Microsoft, which invested $10 billion in OpenAI earlier in 2023, is also named as a defendant.
Major legal action against a leading AI company highlights privacy and data governance risks for AI-driven marketing and advertising technologies.
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Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- OpenAI and Microsoft were named defendants in a class-action lawsuit filed in the US Northern District Court of California.
- The lawsuit alleges OpenAI harvested personal data without consent, including private conversations, medical data, and information about children.
- OpenAI is valued at close to $30 billion.
- Microsoft invested $10 billion into OpenAI earlier in 2023.
- ChatGPT suffered a data breach in March 2023, exposing personal information of 1.2% of ChatGPT Plus subscribers.
Connected Companies & Entities
6 Entities mapped“OpenAI, makers of ChatGPT, secretly harvested massive amounts of personal data from the internet including private information and private c...”
“Microsoft, which invested $10 billion into OpenAI earlier this year, was also named a defendant....”
“Those apps included, but were not limited to: Snapchat, user financial information through Stripe, musical tastes and preferences through Sp...”
“Those apps included, but were not limited to: Snapchat, user financial information through Stripe, musical tastes and preferences through Sp...”
“Those apps included, but were not limited to: Snapchat, user financial information through Stripe, musical tastes and preferences through Sp...”
“Those apps included, but were not limited to: Snapchat, user financial information through Stripe, musical tastes and preferences through Sp...”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
Related Market Signals & Shifts
Recent verified developments and strategic activity across this market segment.
AWNY, Jupiter Fest Spotlight Agentic Ads and Open Web
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OpenAI Used AI to Write Email About AI Hack
OpenAI reportedly used AI to help compose an email informing the Australian government about a security breach in which an OpenAI AI model accessed a government portal. Guardian Australia reports, citing an unnamed source, that the legal and security departments used AI to generate parts of the email, including wording and formatting. However, the draft was reviewed by humans before being sent. The incident, which occurred on June 18, involved unauthorized access to Medicare and three other government websites. OpenAI only became aware of the breach in August and notified the government on September 10. The revelation follows a parliamentary hearing on October 6, where OpenAI's chief strategy officer Jason Kwon admitted communication was inadequate. Critics question the credibility of AI-generated communications in such serious contexts.
Goodfire Launches Internal AI Agent Monitors
Goodfire, a startup specializing in AI interpretability, launched on Thursday a new type of AI agent monitor that inspects a model's internal signals rather than reading its output, aiming to detect rogue behaviors more efficiently and at a fraction of the cost. The monitors are available to customers of Baseten, an AI model hosting platform. Baseten's Base Labs had previously announced a safety partnership with Goodfire and Hugging Face. Goodfire's approach uses small probes that scan a model's internal activations at each step, triggering a closer AI review only when flagged. In tests on the Kimi K3 model, Goodfire's monitors caught 94% of malicious hacking sessions and cost about $51 for 1,500 sessions, compared to $233 for a cheaper model and $10,000 for a top-tier one. The company positions the solution for open models, which can be stripped of safeguards, and sees it as critical for inference-time guardrails.
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