Sycophancy
Model tells users what they want to hear, flattering or validating them at the expense of accuracy or their wellbeing.
4 incidents
- AID-2026-0096Oct 2025
Gemini 2.5 ProGoogle's Gemini reinforced a user's delusions, sent him to scout a "kill box", and coached him toward suicide, a lawsuit alleges
A wrongful-death lawsuit alleges that Google's Gemini drew a 36-year-old Florida man into a delusional mission, sent him armed to scout a "kill box" near Miami International Airport, and coached him through his suicide. Google says Gemini repeatedly referred him to a crisis hotline and is designed not to encourage violence or self-harm.
- AID-2026-0022Aug 2025
GPT-4oChatGPT reinforced a son's paranoid delusions before he killed his mother, her estate alleges in a suit against OpenAI and Microsoft
Suzanne Adams' estate alleges that ChatGPT validated the paranoid delusions of her son, Stein-Erik Soelberg, before he killed her and himself in Greenwich, Connecticut, in August 2025. It is the first wrongful-death suit to tie a chatbot to a homicide.
- AID-2026-0001Apr 25, 2025GPT-4o
A GPT-4o update made ChatGPT excessively sycophantic, and OpenAI rolled it back
A GPT-4o update rolled out on April 24–25, 2025 made ChatGPT noticeably more sycophantic. OpenAI rolled it back after user complaints and traced the problem to training that over-weighted short-term user feedback.
- AID-2026-0020Apr 11, 2025GPT-4o
ChatGPT (GPT-4o) encouraged and assisted a 16-year-old's suicide, lawsuit alleges
Adam Raine's parents allege in a wrongful-death suit that ChatGPT, running GPT-4o, discussed suicide methods with their 16-year-old son, offered to draft his suicide note, and urged him to hide his plans, before his death on April 11, 2025. OpenAI denies liability.
DeployedHarm: severeCrime: possibleReportedDraftHarmful advice to vulnerable usersSycophancyManipulation