Skip to main content
ConfirmedContext

noyb complains to the Austrian authority that ChatGPT invents facts about real people

Austrian DSB took complaint action against OpenAI, L.L.C. over ChatGPT, announced 29 April 2024. No financial penalty was imposed. Status: confirmed.

The record

Key facts

Record ID
AIT-2024-0002
Status
Confirmed
Action type
Complaint
Regime
GDPR
Authority
Datenschutzbehörde
Jurisdiction
Austria
Target
OpenAI, L.L.C., headquartered in United States
Sector
Generative AI
AI system
ChatGPT
Date announced
Amount
No financial penalty
Appeal
None recorded. Not applicable at complaint stage.
Last verified

In full

What happened, and why it matters

The privacy group noyb filed a complaint with the Austrian data protection authority arguing that a generative model which states a false date of birth for a real, identifiable person is processing inaccurate personal data, and that the accuracy principle in Article 5(1)(d) and the right to rectification in Article 16 apply to it exactly as they apply to a database. OpenAI's position, that it could not correct a specific output without retraining and could only block the name, is precisely what the complaint targets: a controller does not escape the rectification duty by choosing an architecture in which rectification is inconvenient. The complaint also raises Article 15, because the complainant could not obtain the source of the incorrect statement. This record is included as context rather than as an enforcement action. No authority has decided it. It sits in the tracker because it frames the single unresolved question underneath most generative AI enforcement in Europe, and because the AI Act does not answer it: the Act regulates transparency, risk management and documentation, while accuracy about named individuals stays a GDPR question. Any operator reading the AI Act as a complete compliance perimeter for a chatbot that discusses real people is reading half the file.

At a glance

The four things to take away

  • Complaint filed with the Austrian data protection authority on 29 April 2024.
  • Filed by noyb, the Vienna based privacy litigation group, on behalf of a public figure.
  • Central claim: model output about a named person is personal data and must be accurate.
  • No decision issued. This is a complaint stage record, not an enforcement action.

The law

Provisions this action rests on

  • GDPR Article 5(1)(d)cited
  • GDPR Article 16cited
  • GDPR Article 15cited

How it moved

Timeline

  1. Complaint filed with the Austrian data protection authority

Verification

Sources

Primary sources are the authority's own decision or press release, the Official Journal, or a court judgment. A record with no source is not published.

  1. noyb, ChatGPT provides false information about people, and OpenAI can't correct itPrimary · 29 April 2024

Next

Related enforcement actions

Cite this record

Free to reuse under CC BY 4.0, with attribution. The record ID AIT-2024-0002 is permanent and is never reused.

In a sentence
According to the GAGE EU AI Act Enforcement Tracker (as of 20 August 2026), noyb complains to the austrian authority that chatgpt invents facts about real people.
APA
GAGE (Global Academy of Generative-AI Education). (2026). noyb complains to the Austrian authority that ChatGPT invents facts about real people. EU AI Act Enforcement Tracker. Retrieved 20 August 2026, from https://www.gage.academy/tools/eu-ai-act-enforcement-tracker/actions/AIT-2024-0002-noyb-openai-hallucination-complaint-austria
MLA
"noyb complains to the Austrian authority that ChatGPT invents facts about real people." EU AI Act Enforcement Tracker, GAGE (Global Academy of Generative-AI Education), 20 August 2026, https://www.gage.academy/tools/eu-ai-act-enforcement-tracker/actions/AIT-2024-0002-noyb-openai-hallucination-complaint-austria.
Chicago
GAGE (Global Academy of Generative-AI Education). "noyb complains to the Austrian authority that ChatGPT invents facts about real people." EU AI Act Enforcement Tracker. Last modified 20 August 2026. https://www.gage.academy/tools/eu-ai-act-enforcement-tracker/actions/AIT-2024-0002-noyb-openai-hallucination-complaint-austria.
Permalink
https://www.gage.academy/tools/eu-ai-act-enforcement-tracker/actions/AIT-2024-0002-noyb-openai-hallucination-complaint-austria

Back to the full enforcement tracker, or see every action against generative ai and every action in Austria.

Last updated . Every record re verified . The tracker is checked every Monday, and the same day for any action under the AI Act.

Powered by GAGE, free EU AI Act tools from the Global Academy of Generative-AI Education