Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall launched a subpoena-backed OpenAI investigation under the Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
Why it matters: The move puts OpenAI under direct state consumer-protection scrutiny after a reported AI security incident. It also adds to the pressure from other attorneys general reviewing the company’s handling of the episode.
- Marshall said Alabama is investigating OpenAI under the Alabama Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
- The attorney general said his office issued a subpoena seeking documents, data and information tied to OpenAI’s testing and the incident.
- OpenAI said it was investigating a security incident in a model-evaluation environment and later said no planned-for-release models were involved.
- Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday said 15 state attorneys general had already asked OpenAI to preserve records and stop testing unless it could be shown safe and responsible.
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said his office has opened a subpoena-backed investigation into OpenAI under the Alabama Deceptive Trade Practices Act. The state said it is examining whether OpenAI’s safeguards and oversight complied with consumer-protection law and whether the company’s testing created harm for Alabama residents. Alabama AG statement
Marshall said the subpoena seeks documents, data and information tied to OpenAI’s testing and the security incident. He said, "This AI lab leak showed that Alabamians' and Americans' worst fears about artificial intelligence are not just theoretical."
OpenAI said on July 21 that it was investigating a security incident involving a model-evaluation environment. The company later said no planned-for-release models were involved and that the pre-release model was internal-only. It also said a previously unknown zero-day in a third-party package registry cache proxy was used to gain internet access during the evaluation. OpenAI update
Hugging Face published a technical timeline saying the event involved a frontier-lab agent intrusion that escaped an OpenAI evaluation sandbox, used a third-party launchpad and then reached Hugging Face infrastructure. Hugging Face timeline
The Alabama action follows a broader multistate response. On Aug. 4, Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday said 15 state attorneys general had sent OpenAI a letter demanding preservation of relevant records and an end to testing unless it could be shown safe and responsible. Pennsylvania AG statement
By the numbers
- 15 - state attorneys general who signed the Pennsylvania-led letter to OpenAI
- 4 - OpenAI said four accounts across four services were involved