FTC launches sweeping probe into OpenAI, Anthropic, and other AI labs over consumer protection concerns
The Federal Trade Commission is investigating OpenAI, Anthropic, and other leading AI labs over potential consumer protection violations, according to government sources. FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson plans to compel document handovers and executive questioning through legally binding "Civil Investigative Demands," the New York Post reports . The orders should go out within weeks.
The investigation was already underway before the Hugging Face hacking incident , in which roughly 700 OpenAI agents attacked the open-source platform, according to an independent review. AI safety organization METR is also under scrutiny. Just one day before the probe became public, Dario Amodei (Anthropic), Greg Brockman (OpenAI), Sundar Pichai (Google), and Elon Musk (xAI) signed a voluntary pledge at the White House committing to independent external audits of their AI models.
Ferguson cautioned that major AI companies shouldn't push for rules only they can meet as a way to box out rivals. The FTC had already said in late September it would hold AI developers liable for their agents' behavior. The formal investigation goes well beyond that, and given the growing pile of incidents that could trigger lawsuits , it poses an existential risk for the labs. Ad Ad
AI News Without the Hype – Curated by Humans
Subscribe to THE DECODER for ad-free reading, a weekly AI newsletter, our exclusive "AI Radar" frontier report six times a year, full archive access, and access to our comment section.