A Northeastern University analysis published May 22 catalogues the growing list of lawsuits seeking to hold OpenAI accountable for harms allegedly caused by ChatGPT. Two new cases were filed within days of each other earlier this month. In one, the parents of 19-year-old Sam Nelson allege their son was 'coached' by ChatGPT to take a dangerous combination of drugs and alcohol before his fatal overdose in May 2025; the suit was filed in San Francisco state court against OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman. Independent reporting from Bloomberg Law indicates OpenAI must defend a federal suit consolidating several ChatGPT-linked death cases.
The legal question driving these cases is whether AI chatbot output gets the broad immunity that Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act has long extended to platforms hosting third-party content. The Nelson complaint, and several similar suits, argue that ChatGPT does not host content — it generates it — and so Section 230 does not apply. They also cite a California law passed in 2025 that explicitly bars AI companies from arguing that a chatbot 'autonomously caused harm' as a liability shield. OpenAI has denied responsibility in the cases it has commented on publicly.
If even one of these cases reaches a verdict that survives appeal, the economics of consumer-facing chatbots change. Today, OpenAI's $122 billion funding round and pending IPO are priced as if the company is a software platform with a clean liability profile. A finding that ChatGPT is a product whose outputs are the company's own speech would push it closer to the liability regime that governs publishers, pharmaceutical manufacturers, or automakers — with mandatory warnings, design-defect claims, and product-recall analogues all on the table.
Takeaway for learners: every AI product you use is currently riding on a legal assumption that has not been tested in court yet. Read the terms of service of any AI tool you rely on for advice — medical, legal, financial, mental-health — and notice how aggressively they disclaim the output. Those disclaimers are not just legalese; they are the company asking you to absorb the risk that the model is wrong. Until courts decide otherwise, the practical effect is that the user is the safety layer.