OpenAI to tighten safety measures after Canada shooter bypassed ban with second account
OpenAI has vowed to strengthen its safety measures as it discovered the Tumbler Ridge mass shooter had a second ChatGPT account – even after the first was banned for policy violations, which were not reported to Canadian police.
Image by Dado Ruvic | Reuters
OpenAI has vowed to strengthen its safety measures as it discovered the Tumbler Ridge mass shooter had a second ChatGPT account – even after the first one was banned for policy violations, which were not reported to Canadian police.
The second account, belonging to the shooter who killed eight people, including six at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, slipped past detection. OpenAI faced criticism after it was revealed that it failed to report the original account to police.
British Columbia Premier David Eby said that the tragedy could have been prevented if the company promptly alerted police to the shooter’s queries.
"They tragically missed the mark in [not] bringing this information forward. The consequences of that will be borne by the families of Tumbler Ridge for the rest of their lives," Eby told reporters on Thursday, according to the BBC.
Ann O’Leary, vice president of global policy at OpenAI, wrote in an open letter to Canadian officials that the company shut down the perpetrator’s account in June 2025, roughly seven months before the attack, but it “did not identify credible and imminent planning that met our threshold to refer the matter to law enforcement.”
In the letter, OpenAI described the work done over the past months to identify signals of potential violence while ensuring the privacy of its users.
As such, the company said it partnered with mental health, behavioural, and law enforcement experts to help define criteria for when conversations cross the line into an imminent risk and warrant a law enforcement referral.
OpenAI adds that it would have reported the account banned in June 2025 to law enforcement if it were discovered today due to more flexible protocols that no longer rely on the user explicitly discussing the target, means, and timing of planned violence with the chatbot.
The company will also establish direct points of contact with Canadian law enforcement authorities, expand its commitment to directing users to relevant support resources, and improve its system for detecting repeat policy violators. In this case, the perpetrator used a second ChatGPT account even after the first one was banned.
The BBC reports that Canada's AI minister Evan Solomon said OpenAI appears willing to improve its safety systems, but "we have not yet seen a detailed plan for how these commitments will be implemented in practice".
He will meet OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman next week "to seek further clarity" on the security guardrails implemented by the firm.
On February 10th, Jesse Van Rootselaar killed six people at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in one of Canada’s deadliest mass shootings after murdering her mother and half-brother at their home. She also injured 27 others before killing herself.