Australian Mayor Prepares World's First Defamation Lawsuit over ChatGPT Content

The mayor of a region in Australia has threatened to take legal action against OpenAI's language model, ChatGPT, over false accusations of bribery.

Brian Hood of Hepburn Shire, is determined to clear his name after ChatGPT linked him to a bribery scandal involving a Reserve Bank of Australia subsidiary. Despite working for the subsidiary, Note Printing Australia, it was Hood who blew the whistle on the illegal activity. If Hood follows through with his threat, it would mark the first-ever defamation lawsuit against the AI service, which launched just last year.

According to Mr Hood's lawyers, he was never charged with a crime. However, they have expressed concern about the accuracy of ChatGPT's responses, which have been known to contain errors and misinformation. In March, they demanded that OpenAI address these issues or face legal action. If a lawsuit is filed, it is likely to focus on the platform's lack of source citation, which could mislead users into accepting its responses as factual.

- CyberBeat