4 Subscribers Sue Anthropic, OpenAI, Google Over AI Slowdown

Four people who pay for AI chatbot subscriptions filed a proposed class-action lawsuit on Friday, Sept. 18, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and SpaceXAI of striking an illegal agreement to slow down their own AI development. The four named plaintiffs subscribe to ChatGPT, Claude, Grok or Gemini and are suing on behalf of a proposed nationwide class of other paying subscribers, according to CBS News and PBS NewsHour, which both carry Associated Press reporting on the filing.

The complaint argues the companies broke antitrust law by coordinating a deceleration instead of each deciding on its own, and that a slower frontier reduces the value subscribers get for what they pay. "The antitrust laws do not permit competitors to decide among themselves that competition is too dangerous," the plaintiffs write. They say they do not object to any single company slowing down for safety reasons; their objection is to what the complaint calls the "shortcut" of substituting "collective restraint for individual accountability."

The suit centers on Sept. 12, 2026, when Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei published an essay urging industrywide cooperation on decelerating capability advances in favor of stronger safety measures, a three-point plan he framed as "pacing the frontier." OpenAI's Sam Altman, SpaceXAI's Elon Musk and Google DeepMind co-founder and chair Demis Hassabis each responded publicly in agreement that same day, the complaint says. SpaceXAI is the name both outlets use for Musk's AI company, the developer of Grok. The filing also points to a July 2026 statement signed by senior staff at several leading labs acknowledging "intense competitive pressure not to unilaterally slow" development.

The legal theory is unusual, because it asks a court to treat a shared safety commitment as a restraint of trade. Amodei flagged that risk himself in the original essay, writing that it would help for the U.S. government to mediate "or at least enable" cross-lab discussions, and that the government would need to "issue a narrow waiver for certain kinds of safety conversations." Altman said OpenAI welcomes a "federal framework that sets consistent safety requirements," but added that "we do not believe we need to wait for an antitrust exemption or legislation to begin the work of providing this confidence."

"AI will quickly spin out of human control and could kill us all if we allow AI safety and protocol ... to be controlled by private self-serving agreements between the world's most powerful 'for profit' technology companies," said Nick Rowley, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs.

Representatives for Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and SpaceXAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Saturday, Sept. 19. The claims are untested allegations, and neither outlet reported a judge assignment, a hearing date or any ruling.

Disclosure: NewUJ's editorial process uses Anthropic's Claude models.