The province of British Columbia sought damages in a California court on Monday over alleged safety violations involving the AI company's user monitoring systems. The lawsuit claims that OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman failed to alert law enforcement to threats made on ChatGPT before the Feb. 10 2026 attack in Tumbler Ridge, which killed 8 people—including 5 children and an educator—and wounded 27 others.
OpenAI detected and banned the shooter's account in June 2025 after an internal review but did not notify police because the activity did not meet its then threshold for "credible and imminent" planning. In a message to Canadian officials on Feb. 26 2026, the company stated its referral criteria are now more flexible and that it would report the account to law enforcement today. British Columbia officials stated that OpenAI has refused to share the specific chat logs with the government.
Key sources
- SOURCE@business“British Columbia filed a lawsuit in California on Monday against OpenAI, alleging it could have used ChatGPT logs to warn police”x.com
- SUPPORT@katiemiller“OpenAI knowingly failed to report them and has thus far failed to share them with the B.C. Government”x.com
- SUPPORT@rohanpaul_ai“under our enhanced law enforcement referral protocol, we would refer the account banned in June 2025 to law enforcement if it were discovered today”x.com
- SOURCEmarketbrief.now