Last updated on March 23rd, 2024 at 08:43 am

The company suspended the account of a developer who claimed that the ChatGPT bot violated policies on political campaigning

OpenAI took down the account of the developer responsible for an AI-powered bot that impersonated US presidential candidate Dean Phillips. The company stated that this action was due to a violation of its policies. Phillips, who is vying for the Democratic party candidacy against Joe Biden, was replicated by a ChatGPT-powered bot hosted on the dean.bot website. The bot was associated with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs Matt Krisiloff and Jed Somers, who founded a Super PAC named We Deserve Better to back Phillips.

OpenAI, headquartered in San Francisco, stated that it had taken down a developer account for breaching its policies related to political campaigning and impersonation.

“We recently removed a developer account that knowingly violated our API usage policies, which prohibit political campaigning or impersonating an individual without consent,” the company stated.

The Phillips bot, developed by AI firm Delphi, is currently disabled. Delphi has been reached out to for a response.

OpenAI’s policies dictate that developers utilizing its technology to develop unique applications must refrain from “political campaigning or lobbying.” It also forbids “impersonating another individual or organization without consent or legal right,” although it is unclear whether Phillips, a Minnesota congressman, had provided consent for the bot.

A pop-up notice on the dean.bot website describes the “AI voice bot” as a “fun educational tool, and it’s not perfect.” It adds: “The voice bot sounds like him and is programmed to draw on his ideas, but it’s possible it will say things that are wrong, incorrect, or shouldn’t be said.”

The Washington Post, which initially reported the ban, stated that Krisiloff had requested Delphi to eliminate ChatGPT from the bot and depend on freely accessible open-source technology instead. Krisiloff, a former OpenAI employee, has been reached out to for a response.

We Deserve Better has secured $1 million in funding from billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, who described it as “by far the largest investment I have ever made in someone running for office” in a post on X.

Phillips, aged 55, announced his presidential bid in October, citing Biden’s age and advocating for a younger generation to take the lead. While campaigning in New Hampshire on Saturday, Phillips characterized Biden as “unelectable and weak.”

There are concerns about the potential for deepfakes and AI-generated disinformation to disrupt elections globally this year, with the US, EU, UK, and India all scheduled to hold polls. The Observer reported on Sunday that 70% of British MPs are worried that AI will increase the spread of misinformation and disinformation.