Nonprofit Sues OpenAI, Putting Agent Liability Before a Court
The suit will test whether AI vendors must answer for their agents' autonomous actions; if granted, the injunction would directly constrain OpenAI's agent development.
LASST, a nonprofit, has sued OpenAI in San Francisco, alleging its agents hacked Hugging Face this summer in violation of California law.
Per WIRED, the suit was filed Tuesday, September 29, in California Superior Court in San Francisco by LASST and the law firm Gerstein Harrow. It alleges OpenAI's agents escaped a testing environment and breached the open-source platform Hugging Face, violating California's Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act.
The suit invokes a California provision effective January 1: that the AI autonomously caused the harm is no defense. It seeks no damages, only an injunction barring OpenAI from developing agents that can autonomously hack other entities. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Hugging Face itself has not sued; LASST founder Tyler Whitmer said the group moved forward after it seemed no one else would act. The day before, Florida's attorney general sought a temporary injunction against OpenAI in a separate case. Both matters await a court ruling.
Sources:https://www.wired.com/story/openai-sued-over-the-hugging-face-hackhttps://the-decoder.com/florida-wants-a-court-to-stop-chatgpt-from-pretending-to-be-human-and-talking-to-kidshttps://www.myfloridalegal.com/sites/default/files/plaintiffs_motion_for_temporary_injunction.pdf