OpenAI in the crosshairs: Scarlett Johansson's scathing statement, mass exodus of executives are among the company’s latest woes (2025)

OpenAI, the company known for developing artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning technology, was the subject of a scathing statement by actress Scarlett Johansson this week, in which she expressed “anger” and “disbelief” to hear a voice “eerily similar” to her own used — without her approval — in a demo of the company’s new speaking feature on its popular AI-powered chatbot, ChatGPT.

The Johansson controversy follows a string of high-profile resignations by OpenAI executives. The company previously has seen multiple employees quitting within weeks of each other. The most recent departure, Jan Leike, said in a May 17 post on X that he disagreed with OpenAI’s leadership and “core priorities,” especially regarding safety.

OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, was ousted from the company in November 2023 but rejoined the board of directors in March, following a legal review.

⏪ Let’s rewind. What exactly is OpenAI?

OpenAI launched in 2015 with a promise to build “safe and beneficial” AI technology and policies.

From 2020 to 2022, it launched a series of AI-powered models that could be used by the public, including DALL-E — which could turn any text into digital images, inspiring many online memes — and ChatGPT, its free AI chatbot that became one of the fastest-growing apps in history. ChatGPT is commonly credited with introducing AI to the general public and helping make OpenAI a household name.

💼 What to know about CEO Sam Altman

Altman, 39, was one of the founders of OpenAI and has been the CEO since 2019. He has been called “the Oppenheimer of AI” by several publications, a reference to J. Robert Oppenheimer, who created the atomic bomb.

Altman's ouster last was a surprise to many people in the AI industry.

In a press release, OpenAI said, “Mr. Altman’s departure follows a deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities. The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI.”

Following backlash from other OpenAI employees, which included an open letter to the board in which nearly half the company’s staff threatened to quit, Altman was reinstated days after being fired.

Read more about the chaos surrounding Altman’s firing and rehiring from AP.

Why are OpenAI executives quitting?

In February, one of the founders of OpenAI, Andrej Karpathy, announced his departure. In early May, vice president of people Diane Yoon and head of nonprofit and strategic initiatives Chris Clark also announced that they were leaving the company.

Weeks later, chief scientist Ilya Sutskever wrote in an X post that he would be leaving OpenAI for another project, which he didn’t name. Sutskever had voted to remove Altman from the CEO position in 2023, citing concerns that Altman was advancing the company’s AI technology too quickly.

Hours after Sutskever resigned, Jan Leike, an executive who worked with Sutskever on projects regarding the safeguarding of AI, announced his resignation. In a series of posts on X, Leike described “building smarter-than-human machines” was an “inherently dangerous endeavor” that wasn’t getting the “crucial research” and “safety culture” that it deserved at the company.

Sutskever’s and Leike’s resignations came on the heels of the release of OpenAI’s newest AI model, GPT-4o — an AI-powered chatbot that now includes speaking capabilities, known as Sky.

🎞️ How is Scarlett Johansson involved?

On May 20, actress Johansson published a statement saying she was “shocked” and “angered” to hear GPT-4o’s voice, referred to as Sky, after several close friends and family members pointed out that it sounded like her voice.

Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI situation. Wow: pic.twitter.com/8ibMeLfqP8

— Bobby Allyn (@BobbyAllyn) May 20, 2024

In the post, Johansson revealed that she had met with Altman in September to discuss hiring her to voice Sky, not unlike her role in the 2013 Spike Jonze film, “Her,” one of Altman’s favorite movies.

Johansson says she ultimately declined the offer. In her statement, she called Sky’s voice “eerily similar” to her own and noted she had hired legal counsel to demand an explanation from OpenAI.

“In a time when we are all grappling with deepfakes and the protection of our own likeness, our own work, our own identities, I believe these are questions that deserve absolute clarity,” Johansson wrote.

“The voice of Sky is not Scarlett Johansson’s, and it was never intended to resemble hers. We cast the voice actor behind Sky’s voice before any outreach to Ms. Johansson,” Altman said in an email to the Washington Post. “We are sorry to Ms. Johansson that we didn’t communicate better.”

OpenAI said that it has since paused Sky and published a blog post saying it had used five voice actors to create the voices for its AI products.

⚖️ Other OpenAI lawsuits

The latest backlash against Sky comes amid several other lawsuits and investigations involving OpenAI. They include:

  • A lawsuit from Elon Musk alleging breach of contract. Musk, one of the co-founders of OpenAI, has accused the company of pursuing profit over its original mission.

  • An investigation by the Federal Trade Commission into big tech investments in AI, including Microsoft’s involvement with OpenAI.

  • An investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission into whether Altman “misled investors.”

  • A lawsuit filed by newspaper publishers in California, Colorado, Illinois, Florida, Minnesota and New York for alleged copyright infringement.

  • Another lawsuit by the New York Times accused OpenAI of training its chatbots using millions of articles.

OpenAI in the crosshairs: Scarlett Johansson's scathing statement, mass exodus of executives are among the company’s latest woes (2025)

FAQs

Why is Scarlett Johansson suing OpenAI? ›

In the age of artificial intelligence, situations are emerging that challenge the laws over rights to a persona. A kerfuffle erupted last week after actor Scarlett Johansson complained that one of OpenAI's chatbot voices sounded a lot like her. It isn't hers — the company created it using recordings from someone else.

Does ChatGPT have a Scarlett Johansson problem? ›

ChatGPT: Scarlett Johansson told OpenAI not to use her voice — and she's not happy they might have anyway. OpenAI is 'in conversations' with Scarlett Johansson over the ChatGPT voice that sounds just like her. OpenAI pulls its Scarlett Johansson-like voice for ChatGPT.

Which actress said this week that she had declined a request from OpenAI to use her voice for its virtual assistant? ›

Johansson's statement says her agent was contacted by Altman two days before last week's demo asking that she reconsider her decision not to work with OpenAI. After seeing the demo, she says she hired legal counsel to write to OpenAI asking for details of how it made the new voice.

Who is the actress suing over AI? ›

Voice Stolen by AI? Scarlett Johansson Sues OpenAI in Groundbreaking Case. Actress Scarlett Johansson claims OpenAI used her voice in an AI tool without consent, fueling discussions on technology ethics.

Who owns most of OpenAI? ›

The OpenAI ownership pie is divided between Microsoft (49%), other stakeholders (49%), and the original OpenAI non-profit foundation, which staunchly preserves its autonomy as the leading firm continues to write OpenAI history. Other OpenAI shareholders include a16z, Sequoia, Tigers Global, and Founders Fund.

Why is OpenAI banned in China? ›

Also, China has tightened “requirements for cross-border data transmission and processing”, and OpenAI now faces “more complex compliance procedures and high costs in the Chinese market”, it said.

Who sued the voice of ChatGPT? ›

However, Johansson accused the company, and its founder Sam Altman, of deliberately copying her voice, in a statement seen by the BBC on Monday evening. “When I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine," she wrote.

Why did Scarlett Johansson split? ›

Scarlett explained that it was all to do with their careers. “Acting is a very strange world to be co-existing in. It's very volatile. There's always going to be the more successful person,” she told Parade when discussing how a relationship can become strained when there are two actors involved.

What is the AI lawsuit over voice? ›

Their 37-page class action lawsuit, filed in the Southern District of New York, alleges that Lovo fraudulently used their voices to “create millions of voiceover productions without permission or proper compensation.” Lehrman uncovered his voice was being used by the company while researching for a role.

What is the misuse of OpenAI? ›

The artificial intelligence firm said the threat actors used its AI models to generate short comments, longer articles in a range of languages, made up names and bios for social media accounts over the last three months.

Who is the person behind OpenAI? ›

In December 2015, OpenAI was founded by Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman, Trevor Blackwell, Vicki Cheung, Andrej Karpathy, Durk Kingma, John Schulman, Pamela Vagata, and Wojciech Zaremba, with Sam Altman and Elon Musk as the co-chairs.

Who is the genius behind OpenAI? ›

Who is Ilya Sutskever? Last year, this was the man that everyone called the genius behind OpenAI. Ilya Sutskever was not only a co founder, but he was the mad scientist who, along with Jeffrey Hinton, helped invent the Alexnet convolutional neural network.

Is AI art legal? ›

AI art, one of the newest mediums for expression, is forbidden from copyright protection because it fails the human authorship requirement under current law. Despite several challenges to this, the Copyright Office holds fast—AI art lacks humanity.

Who is the female leader of AI? ›

Cynthia Rudin is an Earl D. McLean, Jr. Professor at Duke University, and directs the Interpretable Machine Learning Lab. She is the recipient of the 2022 Squirrel AI Award for Artificial Intelligence for the Benefit of Humanity, the most prestigious award in the field.

What voice actors are suing a company? ›

Two voice actors are suing an artificial intelligence startup in a proposed federal class action lawsuit for violating trademark laws, to train their AI. Paul Skye Lehrman and Linnea Sage were hired by Lovo, an AI company, back in 2019 and 2020 to provide voice clips for what they were told would be internal research.

How much did Microsoft pay to OpenAI? ›

Only a fraction of Microsoft's $10 billion investment in OpenAI has been wired to the startup, while a significant portion of the funding, divided into tranches, is in the form of cloud compute purchases instead of cash, according to people familiar with their agreement.

Who is OpenAI funded by? ›

Big-name venture capital funds Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital, Founders Fund, Thrive, K2 Global, and Andreessen Horowitz put their wallets together in April 2023, pouring a total of $300 million into OpenAI.

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