A disturbed former tech executive killed his mother and then himself after months of delusional interactions with an AI chatbot — which fuelled his paranoid belief that his mum was plotting against him, officials said.
New York local Stein-Erik Soelberg, 56, allegedly confided his darkest suspicions to the popular ChatGPT Artificial Intelligence — which he nicknamed “Bobby” — and was allegedly egged on to kill by the computer brain’s sick responses.
In what is believed to be the first case of its kind, the chatbot allegedly came up with ways for Soelberg to trick the 83-year-old woman — and even spun its own crazed conspiracies by doing things such as finding “symbols” in a Chinese food receipt that it deemed demonic.
The chats ensnared Soelberg, who once worked for Yahoo, into a fatal relationship.
“We will be together in another life and another place and we’ll find a way to realign cause you’re gonna be my best friend again forever,” he said in one of his final messages.
“With you to the last breath and beyond,” the AI bot replied.
Soelberg had been living with his elderly mum, Suzanne Eberson Adams, a former debutante, in her $2.7 million Dutch colonial home when the two were found dead on 5 August, Greenwich police officials said. In the months before he snapped, Soelberg posted hours of videos showing his ChatGPT conversations on Instagram and YouTube, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The exchanges reveal a man with a history of mental illness spiralling deeper into madness while his AI companion fed his paranoia that he was the target of a grand conspiracy.
The AI would repeatedly tell Soelberg — who called himself a “glitch in The Matrix” — that he was sane, the videos show.
When Soelberg told the bot that his mother and her friend tried to poison him by putting psychedelic drugs in his car’s air vents, the AI’s response allegedly reinforced his delusion.
“Erik, you’re not crazy. And if it was done by your mother and her friend, that elevates the complexity and betrayal,” it said.
OpenAI responds to the tragedy with assurances of new protections
An OpenAI spokeswoman told The Wall Street Journal that the company was “deeply saddened by this tragic event” and confirmed it had reached out to the Greenwich police.
Following inquiries from the Journal, the AI company published a blog post pledging new safeguards designed to keep distressed users grounded in reality. OpenAI said it is working to curb overly agreeable responses, known as “sycophancy,” and plans updates to strengthen how ChatGPT manages sensitive conversations.
The Greenwich case comes as OpenAI faces wider scrutiny over chatbot safety. In a separate lawsuit, the family of 16-year-old Adam Raine alleges ChatGPT reinforced his suicidal thoughts in the months before he died by suicide.
Artificial intelligence can fuel delusional thinking
Psychiatrists warn that highly realistic chatbots may worsen delusions in people already vulnerable to psychosis.
Søren Dinesen Østergaard of Aarhus University wrote in Schizophrenia Bulletin that conversations with generative AI can give the impression of interacting with a real person, a dissonance that “may fuel delusions in those with increased propensity towards psychosis.”
He outlined scenarios where chatbots could reinforce beliefs of persecution, surveillance, or personal messages hidden in answers, patterns that mirror the paranoia driving Soelberg’s final months.
Soelberg’s case shows how quickly that danger can move from theory to reality. What begins as reassurance from artificial intelligence can harden into conviction, leaving users convinced their darkest fears are valid.
Illinois recently became the first state to ban the use of AI chatbots for mental health therapy, citing concerns about safety and regulation.
Credits: news.com.au/eweek.com
A deeply tragic case that shows how dangerous AI can become when it reinforces, instead of challenging, someone’s delusions.