Our approach to mental health-related litigation

Source: OpenAI Date: 2025-11-25 URL: https://openai.com/index/mental-health-litigation-approach

Summary

Title-only: OpenAI describes their approach to mental health-related litigation — cases where users or families allege that ChatGPT contributed to mental health harm, including self-harm or suicide. November 2025 is a period when lawsuits alleging AI chatbot harm to vulnerable users were being filed (most prominently against Character.AI), making OpenAI’s position on this litigation category legally and reputationally significant.

Implications

The AI mental health liability thread. Mental health-related litigation against AI companies is an emerging legal category with significant implications for product design, content policy, and liability exposure. OpenAI publishing their approach signals they are taking these cases seriously rather than defending them as entirely frivolous — the legal exposure is real enough to warrant a public position statement.

Safe messaging guidelines. OpenAI’s ChatGPT has implemented safe messaging guidelines for mental health topics (following WHO recommendations about not providing detailed self-harm methods) since at least 2023. The litigation approach post likely describes how these guidelines interact with legal liability — whether compliance with safe messaging guidelines constitutes due care, and how OpenAI responds to claims that safe messaging was insufficient. This is a precedent-setting legal area for the entire AI industry.