ROME (AP) — Italy’s data protection watchdog said Friday it has fined OpenAI 15 million euros ($15.6 million) after wrapping up a probe into the collection of personal data by the U.S. artificial intelligence company's popular chatbot ChatGPT.
The country’s privacy watchdog, known as Garante, said its investigation showed that OpenAI processed users’ personal data to train ChatGPT “without having an adequate legal basis and violated the principle of transparency and the related information obligations towards users”.
OpenAI dubbed the decision “disproportionate” and said it will appeal.
“When the Garante ordered us to stop offering ChatGPT in Italy in 2023, we worked with them to reinstate it a month later,” an OpenAI spokesperson said Friday in an emailed statement. “They’ve since recognized our industry-leading approach to protecting privacy in AI, yet this fine is nearly 20 times the revenue we made in Italy during the relevant period.”
OpenAI added, however, it remained “committed to working with privacy authorities worldwide to offer beneficial AI that respects privacy rights.”
The investigation, launched last year, also found that OpenAI didn’t provide an “adequate age verification system” to prevent users under 13 years of age from being exposed to inappropriate AI-generated content, the watchdog said.
The Italian authority also ordered OpenAI to launch a six-month campaign on different Italian media to raise public awareness about ChatGPT, specifically in regard to data collection.
The booming popularity of generative artificial intelligence systems like ChatGPT has drawn scrutiny from regulators on both sides of the Atlantic.
Regulators in the U.S. and Europe have been examining OpenAI and other companies that have played a key part in the AI boom, while governments around the world have been drawing up rules to protect against risks posed by AI systems, led by the European Union's AI Act, a comprehensive rulebook for artificial intelligence.
AP Business Writer Kelvin Chan in London contributed to this report
FILE - The OpenAI logo is displayed on a cell phone in front of an image generated by ChatGPT's Dall-E text-to-image model, Dec. 8, 2023, in Boston. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)
A day before a potential government shutdown, the House rejected President-elect Donald Trump’s new plan Thursday to fund operations and suspend the debt ceiling, as Democrats and dozens of Republicans refused to accommodate his sudden demands.
Here's the latest:
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is calling on House Speaker Mike Johnson to return to a stopgap funding agreement he had negotiated with Democrats.
Schumer, a New York Democrat, called that agreement in a floor speech Friday morning “the quickest, simplest, and easiest way we can make sure the government stays open while delivering critical emergency aid to the American people.”
Johnson abandoned that legislation earlier this week after first Elon Musk, then President-elect Donald Trump opposed it. But the Republican speaker is facing few options to avert a government shutdown at the end of the day while also appeasing the demands of his fellow Republicans.
Democratic leaders so far have demanded that he stick to their deal in order to gain their support to pass it through Congress.
Friday morning, Trump continued his insistence that a debt ceiling increase be included in any deal — and if not, let the closures “begin now.”
He issued his latest demand as Speaker Johnson arrived early at the Capitol, instantly holing up with Vice President-elect JD Vance and some of the most conservative Republicans in the House Freedom Caucus who helped sink Trump’s bill in a spectacular Thursday evening flop.
“If there is going to be a shutdown of government, let it begin now,” Trump posted on social media.
Trump does not fear government shutdowns the way Johnson and the lawmakers see federal closures as political losers that harm the livelihoods of Americans. The incoming Trump administration vows to slash the federal budget and fire thousands of employees. Trump himself sparked the longest government shutdown in history in his first term at the White House.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries laid blame for the failure of a package to fund the federal government on Republican donors and the GOP’s economic agenda.
“Republicans would rather cut taxes for billionaire donors than fund research for children with cancer,” Jeffries, D-N.Y., wrote on the social media platform Bluesky.
The House Democrat’s leader further predicted a government shutdown “will crash the economy, hurt working class Americans and likely be the longest in history.”
“Welcome back to the MAGA swamp,” he concluded.
Before 9 a.m., a number of the speaker’s biggest critics brought their grievances to a private meeting as a shutdown deadline looms over Capitol Hill. Reps. Chip Roy, Andy Biggs, Bob Good and others, all who voted against the Trump-backed plan Thursday, met with Johnson as Republicans look for a way forward on a short-term spending deal that includes a suspension of the nation’s debt limit.
Good of Virginia came out and said he would surprised if there was a vote Friday on any path forward. Moments later, Rep. Lauren Boebert said Republicans were making progress and having Vice President-elect JD Vance in the room is helping move things toward a resolution that can get a majority on the floor.
“I think President Trump was possibly, sold a bad bill yesterday,” the Colorado lawmaker said. “I did not want to see a failure on the House floor for the first demand that President Trump is making.”
But, she added, the failure on the floor has forced many of her colleagues to come together Friday.
As the speaker twisted Thursday in Washington, his peril was on display at Turning Point USA’s conservative AmericaFest confab, where Trump ally and 2016 campaign architect Steven Bannon stirred thousands with a takedown of the Louisiana Republican.
“Clearly, Johnson is not up to the task. He’s gotta go. He’s gotta go,” Bannon said, drawing cheers and whistles.
Bannon, both a bellwether of and influencer on the mood among Trump’s core supporters, wasn’t done.
“He doesn’t have what we call the right stuff — that combination of guts and moxie and savvy and toughness,” he said, comparing Johnson, a reserved, polite lawyer, to the gleeful brutishness of the president-elect and his populist backers. “You can punch MAGA in the face and they’re going to get up off the canvas, and they’re going to punch you back three times harder.”
Bannon didn’t float a replacement for Johnson but emphasized that the job description for any speaker — and every other Republican in Washington — is simple: “We have nothing to discuss. It’s only about the execution of President Trump’s plan.”
And he called Thursday’s proposed deal “laughable.”
“It’s not a serious proposal,” Jeffries said as he walked to Democrats’ own closed-door caucus meeting. Inside, Democrats were chanting, “Hell, no!”
Coming and going outside Speaker Mike Johnson’s office Thursday night, House Republicans offered little clarity on a path forward for a budget deal after a Trump-endorsed proposal failed to pass.
Rep. Kat Cammack, a Republican who voted against the bill, told reporters that “this was not an easy vote for constitutional conservatives.” She added, “We’re going to work through the night and figure out a plan.”
“We are still working diligently. and we are still making progress,” Rep. Lisa McClain said, without offering further details.
“We tried several things today most of our members went for, but the Democrats decided that they want to try and shut it down, but we’re going to keep working,” Rep. Steve Scalise, the Republican majority leader, told reporters. Nearly three dozen Republicans joined Democrats in voting down the resolution.
Vice President Kamala Harris cancelled a planned trip to Los Angeles with Washington on the verge of a government shutdown.
She had been scheduled to travel to her home state late Thursday, but instead will remain in the capital, the White House said, after Republicans backed away from a bipartisan compromise to fund the government.
The House rejected President-elect Donald Trump’s new plan Thursday to fund operations and suspend the debt ceiling.
In a hastily convened evening vote punctuated by angry outbursts over the self-made crisis, the lawmakers failed to reach the two-thirds threshold needed for passage — but House Speaker Mike Johnson appeared determined to reassess, before Friday’s midnight deadline.
“We’re going to regroup and we will come up with another solution, so stay tuned,” Johnson said after the vote. The cobbled-together plan didn’t even get a majority, with the bill failing 174-235.
The outcome proved a massive setback for Trump and his billionaire ally, Elon Musk, who rampaged against Johnson’s bipartisan compromise, which Republicans and Democrats had reached earlier to prevent a Christmastime government shutdown.
▶ Read more about the vote and where things stand
FILE - Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump delivers remarks on the damage and federal response to Hurricane Helene, in Swannanoa, N.C., Oct. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talks briefly to reporters just before a vote on an interim spending bill to prevent a government shutdown, at the Capitol in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
