OpenAI is facing investigation from a group of state attorneys general

OpenAI is under investigation by a coalition of state attorneys general, according to the Wall Street Journal. On Friday, June 12, the company received a subpoena seeking information and documents related to its activities and impact on users. The Journal said it viewed the subpoena sent by New York's attorney general. 

Based on what the publication saw, the AGs are asking for documentation about the company's advertising, user engagement and retention, as well as its handling of its users' data and health information. They also want to know about the company's activities related to minor and senior users, its deep learning models, its policies and its models' sycophancy. 

"AI is a new and powerful technology, and we work every day to safely bring its benefits to people in a responsible way," an OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement to the Journal. "We take the concerns raised by state attorneys general seriously and intend to engage constructively with their offices."

It's unclear what prompted the investigation, but tech companies developing AI products have been under scrutiny by state AGs for quite a while now. Last year, a group of 44 state AGs sent a letter to Meta, Google, Apple, Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity AI and XAI, asking them to protect children from being exposed to inappropriate and potentially harmful chatbot interactions. In April, Florida Attorney General James Ulthmeier opened a criminal investigation into OpenAI, because the suspect in the 2025 Florida State University mass shooting reportedly used ChatGPT.

More recently, another parent filed a wrongful death lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the company of not implementing enough safeguards to protect users from taking their own life. The lawsuit claimed that the plaintiff's daughter who died by suicide discussed her suicidal thoughts and plans with the chatbot in the months leading up to her death. However, the company didn't alert the family or authorities. OpenAI was named as a defendant in the first ever wrongful death lawsuit linked to a chatbot, as well.

Just a few days ago, OpenAI filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission to go public. It hasn't decided on timing and pricing yet.