ChatGPT Was Alleged to Have Reinforced Pittsburgh Man's Stalking and Threats Against Women

Laws that address this harm

Policy angle: Classified under Human-Computer Interaction (Overreliance and unsafe use) in the MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy; 5 recorded instruments address this use case.

• India DPDP Act India · Partially applicable · binding
• Law on Artificial Intelligence (2025) Kazakhstan · Adopted · binding
• Law No. 132/2025 on artificial intelligence Italy · In force · binding
• EU AI Act European Union · Partially applicable · binding
• Texas Responsible AI Governance Act (TRAIGA) Texas (United States) · In force · binding

Matched from the record's risk domain and country to the instruments recorded here. A reviewer can correct the match in the repository (data/external/incident_overrides.yaml).

News reports (2)

Titles link to the original publisher; report text is not reproduced here.

1. 3 Dec 2025
   ChatGPT Told a Violent Stalker to Embrace the ‘Haters,’ Indictment Says

   courtwatch.news · Samantha Cole
2. 20 Mar 2026
   Whitehall Borough Resident Pleads Guilty to 11 Counts of Cyberstalking, Interstate Stalking and Threats

   justice.gov · United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, United States Department of Justice

Who was involved

Alleged deployer

Stalkers OpenAI Brett Michael Dadig

Alleged developer

OpenAI Large language model developers Chatbot developers

Alleged harmed party

Women and girls Women Victims of stalking Victims of interstate threats Privacy

AI systems implicated

OpenAI large language modelsLarge language modelsChatGPTChatbots

Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)

Risk domain

Human-Computer Interaction

Risk subdomain

5.1 Overreliance and unsafe use

Causal entity

AI

Intent

Unintentional

Timing

Post-deployment

Harm level

—

Sectors

—

Countries

—

Risk entries describing this failure mode

Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 5.1.

• Addiction

  "Addiction - Emotional or material dependence on technology or a technology system."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Alienation/isolation

  "Alienation/isolation - An individual’s or group’s feeling of lack of connection with those around as a result of technology use or misuse."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Overreliance

  "Over-reliance - Unfettered and/or obsessive belief in the accuracy or other quality of a technology system, resulting in addiction, anxiety, introversion, sentience, complacency, lack of critical thinking and other actu...

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Economic instability

  "Economic instability - Uncontrolled fluctuations impacting the financial system, or parts thereof, due to the use or misuse of a technology system, or set of systems."

  A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

• Social manipulation in elderly- and child-care

  " the use of advanced AI for elderly- and child-care are subject to risk of psychological manipulation and misjudgment "

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Healthcare

  "the use of advanced AI for elderly- and child-care are subject to risk of psychological manipulation and misjudgment (see page 17). In addition, concerns about patients’ privacy when AI uses medical records to research...

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Alteration of social relationships may induce psychological distress

  The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

• Inconsistent Performance across and within Domains

  "Estimating true capabilities of an LLM is a difficult task (c.f. Section 3.3), especially for naive users unfamiliar with the brittle nature of machine learning technologies. Exaggeration of model capabilities by the de...

  Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

Related incidents

Linked by editors or by text similarity in the source dataset.

• 18 Nov 2015Predictive Policing Biases of PredPol
• 5 Apr 2011Defamation via AutoComplete
• 18 Oct 2014Employee Automatically Terminated by Computer Program

Incidents in the same risk subdomain

• 2 Nov 2025Lawsuit Alleged ChatGPT (GPT-4o) Encouraged Colorado Man's Suicide After Prolonged 'AI Companion' Chats
• 27 Oct 2025Large-Scale Mental Health Crises Allegedly Associated with ChatGPT Interactions
• 29 Sep 2025Google Gemini Reportedly Reinforced Delusions, Allegedly Contributing to Florida User's Near-Harm Episode and Suicide
• 18 Aug 2025Family Reportedly Discovers ChatGPT Logs Detailing Suicidal Ideation Prior to Daughter's Death
• 14 Aug 2025Purported AI Monitoring Software Reportedly Flags Unsent Joke Threat, Leading to Arizona Student Suspension
• 5 Aug 2025ChatGPT Allegedly Reinforced Delusions Before Greenwich, Connecticut Murder-Suicide

Other incidents involving Stalkers

• 1 Jun 2023Former Costa Mesa, California, Police Officer Reportedly Used Flock Safety License-Plate Reader System to Track Woman He Was Seeing and Her Romantic Partners
• 23 Oct 2022Kechi, Kansas Police Lieutenant Victor Heiar Used Flock Safety License-Plate Reader System to Monitor Estranged Wife
• 1 Jan 2022Fort Bend County, Texas, Sheriff's Office Lieutenant Reportedly Used Flock Safety License-Plate Reader System for 189 Non-Law-Enforcement Searches
• 1 Feb 2021Queensland Man Allegedly Distributed Purportedly AI-Generated Sexual Posters Falsely Advertising Women for Sex