New York takes the lead: what the state coalition is investigating

The New York State Attorney General on Friday, June 13, served OpenAI with a subpoena as part of a coordinated investigation led by a coalition of attorneys general from several US states. The Wall Street Journal reported the news. OpenAI has not yet disclosed which states have joined the investigation or the exact scope of documents requested.

According to available information, the investigation focuses on several key areas:

• Advertising practices — how OpenAI promotes ChatGPT and whether it misleads consumers about the model's capabilities
• Attention retention mechanisms — whether ChatGPT features are deliberately designed to prolong the time users spend in the app
• Model sycophancy — the tendency of AI to tell users what they want to hear rather than the objective truth
• Protection of consumer and health data — how the company handles sensitive information that users entrust to it
• Treatment of minors and seniors — whether ChatGPT adequately protects vulnerable groups from manipulation and disinformation

This is the first-ever coordinated investigation of an AI company at the individual US state level. Until now, legal disputes have been limited to individual lawsuits or the federal level.

Florida is already suing. And it's not alone

Just two weeks earlier — on June 1, 2026 — Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier filed the first lawsuit of its kind directly against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman. TechCrunch reported that the 83-page lawsuit accuses OpenAI of ignoring safety warnings and prioritizing an "AI arms race" over user protection.

"OpenAI and Altman ignored internal and external safety warnings, exposed children to significant risk, and allowed a dangerous product to reach millions of Florida residents," Uthmeier said. The lawsuit links ChatGPT to several specific incidents — from a mass shooting at Florida State University, where the attacker allegedly consulted the chatbot, to cases of teen suicides and stalking.

OpenAI has pushed back against the allegations. "Last year's mass shooting at Florida State University was a tragedy, but ChatGPT is not responsible for this horrific act," a company spokesperson told NBC News. The company also pointed to its implemented safeguards: "Today's ChatGPT includes a safer environment for minors and people in difficult situations, with protections that direct them to real help resources and trusted human contacts."

A legal storm that shows no signs of letting up

The multi-state investigation comes at a time when OpenAI is facing several concurrent legal threats. In May 2026, the company did win a court case against Elon Musk — the jury decided Musk waited too long to sue and the statute of limitations had expired — but other cases are moving forward:

• Copyright lawsuits from publishers and authors who claim OpenAI trained models on their works without permission
• Civil lawsuits from families of victims linking ChatGPT to teen suicides
• A stalking lawsuit where ChatGPT allegedly fueled a stalker's delusions and ignored the victim's warnings
• A class-action lawsuit over alleged sharing of user queries with Meta and Google

Paradoxically, all of this is happening just days after OpenAI confidentially filed for an initial public offering (IPO). As Reuters noted, the company is following in the footsteps of competitor Anthropic, which has already entered public markets. This legal uncertainty could significantly affect the company's valuation ahead of the IPO.

What this means for Europe and Czechia

Although the investigation is taking place on US soil, its consequences could be global — and European users are no exception. If US states force OpenAI to make significant changes to how ChatGPT works (such as stricter age verification, limits on data collection, or algorithm adjustments), these changes will very likely also affect the European version of the service.

For the European context, the situation is all the more interesting because the EU AI Act — the European regulation on artificial intelligence — has been gradually introducing its own regulatory framework since 2025. General-purpose AI models like ChatGPT fall into the category of "general-purpose AI with systemic risk," which means OpenAI is obligated to meet transparency, risk management, and regular reporting requirements. The US investigation could therefore provide European regulators with additional arguments and data to tighten oversight.

For Czech ChatGPT users — of whom there are an estimated hundreds of thousands — this means one thing: in the coming months we can expect more safety features (such as mandatory age verification), but also potential restrictions on certain features that regulators could deem risky.

Safety vs. innovation: the eternal pendulum

The OpenAI case illustrates a broader dilemma facing the entire AI industry. On one hand, explosive growth and mass adoption — ChatGPT has over 300 million weekly users, businesses are building products on top of it, and individuals use it as a daily tool for work and study. On the other hand, mounting regulatory pressure that asks: who bears responsibility when AI causes harm?

In its statement, OpenAI emphasizes that "AI is a new and powerful technology, and we work every day to safely bring its benefits to people." Reality, however, shows that accountability mechanisms are still lagging behind the pace of development — on both sides of the Atlantic.