{"meta":{"exportedAt":"2026-10-23T16:30:44.418Z","formatVersion":2,"selection":{"q":"hallucination","system":"","harm":"","context":"","country":"","role":"","relation":"unknown","evidence":"","year":"","response":"","severity":"","verification":"","view":"incidents","sort":"added"},"totalIncidents":3,"coverage":{"cases":3,"countries":2,"languages":1,"unknownLocation":1,"locationPending":0,"unknownLanguage":0,"unknownDate":0,"lawsuits":1,"regulatory":1,"minors":0,"coreRelations":0,"contextualRelations":0,"mixedRelations":0,"unknownRelations":3,"relationPending":2,"relationUnknown":1},"countingNote":"Distinct public cases in this selection. People counts apply within individual cases only; cross-case person overlap has not been resolved. No population incidence estimate.","affectedCountNote":"Interpret person counts with affectedCountStatus and the reported effects. Unquantified zeros are placeholders, not a measured zero.","source":"AI incidents","publisher":"NOPE","url":"https://nope.net/incidents","license":"CC BY 4.0"},"incidents":[{"id":"2026-south-africa-home-affairs-suspends-two-officials-over-apparent-ai-hallucinated-references-in-immigration-white-paper","caseFacts":{"claims":[{"id":"c1","status":"documented","evidence":[{"locator":"is suspending two senior officials with immediate effect following the detection of apparent Artificial Intelligence (AI) “hallucinations” cited as references appended to the recently Cabinet-approved Revised White Paper on Citizenship, Immigration and Refugee Protection","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"The Department of Home Affairs said it was suspending two senior officials with immediate effect after detecting apparent AI hallucinations cited as references appended to the recently Cabinet-approved Revised White Paper on Citizenship, Immigration and Refugee Protection.","causal_attribution":"The department's own statement."},{"id":"c2","status":"documented","evidence":[{"locator":"The precautionary suspension of a Chief Director in the relevant unit was carried out this afternoon, while the suspension of a Director involved in the drafting process will be effected on Monday.","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"The department on Thursday announced the suspension of two officials associated with a key policy document that recently underwent a revision.","relation":"supports","source_id":"s2"}],"assertion":"A chief director was placed on precautionary suspension on 30 April 2026 and the suspension of a director involved in the drafting was to take effect the following Monday.","causal_attribution":"The department's statement of 30 April 2026 (a Thursday)."},{"id":"c3","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"It seems that these references were generated and attached to the document after the fact, as they are not cited in the body of the text. Consequently, the Department has withdrawn the reference list, pending the finalisation of the independent probe","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"According to the department's initial review, the references appear to have been generated and attached after the fact because they are not cited in the body of the text, and the department withdrew the reference list pending an independent probe.","causal_attribution":"The department's initial internal review, hedged ('appears', 'seems'); who generated the references is not stated."},{"id":"c4","status":"documented","evidence":[{"locator":"the Department has appointed two independent law firms to respectively manage the disciplinary process and review all policy documents produced by the Department dating back to 30 November 2022","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"The department appointed two independent law firms, one to manage the disciplinary process and one to review all its policy documents since 30 November 2022, and said it would introduce AI checks and declarations in its internal approvals.","causal_attribution":"The department's statement."},{"id":"c5","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"are not materially affected by the apparent AI hallucinations contained in the standalone reference list","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"The department said the body of the White Paper continues to reflect the government's position and is not materially affected by the apparent AI hallucinations in the standalone reference list.","causal_attribution":"The department's own assessment."}],"effects":[{"label":"two senior officials placed on precautionary suspension with a disciplinary process","claim_id":"c2","direction":"negative"}],"sources":[{"id":"s1","url":"https://www.gov.za/news/media-statements/home-affairs-suspends-two-officials-over-ai-use-linked-revised-white-paper","kind":"government_statement","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Read on 2026-10-17 (HTTP 200) on the South African Government website; dated 30 April 2026 in the page metadata.","independence_group":"dha-statement-30-april-2026"},{"id":"s2","url":"https://www.citizen.co.za/news/home-affairs-officials-suspended-ai-hallucinations/","kind":"news","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Read on 2026-10-17 (HTTP 200). Published 1 May 2026; reports and quotes the department's statement, so the same group.","independence_group":"dha-statement-30-april-2026"}],"version":1,"ai_roles":["unknown"],"contexts":["work","public_services"],"unknowns":["Who used the AI tool, which tool it was, and when the reference list was generated.","Whether either suspended official used AI; the statement links the director to the drafting process only.","The outcome of the independent probe and the disciplinary process."],"geography":{"basis":"The White Paper is a document of South Africa's Department of Home Affairs, which suspended the two officials. Where the officials live is not used.","court_countries":[],"event_countries":["ZA"],"affected_person_countries":[]},"publication":{"basis":"Published as a consequential response to AI use: the Department of Home Affairs suspended two senior officials and opened a disciplinary process after its review found apparent AI-hallucinated references appended to a Cabinet-approved White Paper.","reviewed_on":"2026-10-17"},"ai_involvement":{"basis":"Consequential response: the department suspended two officials in response to what its initial internal review describes as apparent AI hallucinations in the references appended to the White Paper, which it says appear to have been generated and attached after the fact. The department does not say who used the AI tool or which tool it was, so no relation between the AI output and the suspended officials is established.","status":"reported"},"person_relations":["unknown"]},"name":"South Africa's Home Affairs department suspends two senior officials after apparent AI-hallucinated references were found in its immigration White Paper","summary":"South Africa's Department of Home Affairs announced on 30 April 2026 that it was suspending two senior officials with immediate effect after apparent AI hallucinations were found among the references appended to its recently Cabinet-approved Revised White Paper on Citizenship, Immigration and Refugee Protection. A chief director was placed on precautionary suspension that afternoon, and a director involved in the drafting was to be suspended the following Monday. The department said its initial review indicated that the references were generated and attached to the document after the fact, since they are not cited in its body; it withdrew the reference list pending an independent probe into how the hallucinations were added. It appointed two independent law firms, one to manage the disciplinary process and one to review all policy documents the department has produced since 30 November 2022, and said it would introduce AI checks and declarations in its approval process. The department apologised and said the body of the White Paper is not materially affected. Who used the AI tool, and which tool, is not stated.","incidentDate":"2026-04-30","incidentKind":"single_event","incidentDatePrecision":"day","exposurePattern":"unknown","reportedDate":"2026-04-30","aiSystem":"An unidentified generative AI tool that, according to the department's initial review, appears to have generated the reference list appended to the Revised White Paper on Citizenship, Immigration and Refugee Protection","aiProduct":"Unidentified AI writing tool","severity":"low","verificationStatus":"credible","harmCategories":[],"harmOutcomes":["professional_harm"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"According to the department's statement, two senior officials were placed on precautionary suspension, with a disciplinary process managed by an independent law firm, after apparent AI-hallucinated references were found in a White Paper.","frameworkFacets":[],"causationStatus":"supported","participantUsersAffectedMin":0,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":2,"affectedCountStatus":"exact","affectedCountEvidence":"Two people: the chief director and the director whose precautionary suspensions the department announced. Whether either used the AI tool is not stated, so they are counted as other people harmed rather than as AI users.","victimAgeRange":"adult","jurisdiction":"ZA","platformType":"other","outcomeType":"internal_action","outcomeStatus":"ongoing","primarySourceUrl":"https://www.gov.za/news/media-statements/home-affairs-suspends-two-officials-over-ai-use-linked-revised-white-paper","primarySourceLabel":"South African Government (Department of Home Affairs), Home Affairs suspends two officials over AI use linked to revised White Paper (30 April 2026)","firstPublishedAt":"2026-10-17T03:16:20.299322+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-10-17T03:16:20.299322+00:00","scopeVersion":"facts-v3","tags":["south-africa","public-sector","policy-document","fictitious-references","suspension"]},{"id":"2026-jacquez-v-openai","metadataReview":{"version":1,"geography":{"basis":"Re-checked on 2026-10-11 against the cited Futurism body (read live, English), its Yahoo syndication (same text) and the JCCP 5431 coordination order PDF. Futurism, on Jacquez's own account, says that during the delusional episode 'he physically went to the University of California, Berkeley' Physics department to show experts his imagined discoveries and 'was kicked out'; that visit is an act within the reported adverse experience and is located in the United States, which supports event_countries US. Futurism does not say where the hospitalisations, the September 2024 and April-May 2025 episodes or the self-injury took place; those remain unlocated, and the event country rests only on the Berkeley visit. Futurism calls him 'a 34-year-old Bay Area man' (the person's location), which supports affected_person_countries US. The coordination order lists 'Jacquez v. OpenAI, Inc., et al., Superior Court of California, County of Alameda, Case No. 26CV165635' and Futurism reports the suit 'filed this week in California', which support court_countries US. The court's seat and the plaintiff's residence were not used as the event location.","evidence":[{"kind":"existing_record","locator":"Bay Area, California","location":"victim_description","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"existing_record","locator":"California Superior Court for Alameda County","location":"outcome_details","supports":["court_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"Jacquez says he physically went to the University of California, Berkeley","location":"https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mental-illness-chatgpt-psychosis-lawsuit","supports":["event_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"is a 34-year-old Bay Area man named John Jacquez","location":"https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mental-illness-chatgpt-psychosis-lawsuit","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"The plaintiff in the case, filed this week in California","location":"https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mental-illness-chatgpt-psychosis-lawsuit","supports":["court_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"of California, County of Alameda, Case No.","location":"https://reason.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/chatgpt-product-liability-cases-coordination.pdf","supports":["court_countries"],"countries":["US"]}],"court_countries":["US"],"event_countries":["US"],"affected_person_countries":["US"]},"unresolved":["The complaint (Alameda Superior Court Case No. 26CV165635) was not obtained; no public copy was found, so any location it gives for the hospitalisations is unchecked.","The event country rests on one episode located by Futurism on Jacquez's account (the UC Berkeley visit); the locations of the hospitalisations and other episodes are not stated in the inspected bodies."],"reviewed_on":"2026-10-11","source_reviews":[{"url":"https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mental-illness-chatgpt-psychosis-lawsuit","notes":"Cited primary source. Fetched live on 2026-10-11 (HTTP 200, html lang en-US, English, about 12,000 characters of article text; published Jan 21, 2026). Based on the complaint and an interview with Jacquez. Describes him as a Bay Area man living with his father, sister and her children; the September 2024 first ChatGPT-tied hospitalisation; the April 2025 memory upgrade; police involvement and about four weeks of combined inpatient and intensive outpatient care; the 17 May 2025 exchange; and his visit to the UC Berkeley Physics department, from which he was kicked out. Names no hospital, city or county for the hospitalisations. Does not name the county of filing.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/man-had-managed-mental-illness-200901701.html","notes":"Fetched live on 2026-10-11 (HTTP 200, html lang en-US, English). Syndicated copy of the Futurism article with the same text, including the Bay Area and Berkeley passages; derivative and not independent.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://reason.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/chatgpt-product-liability-cases-coordination.pdf","notes":"JCCP 5431 Order re Petition for Coordination (San Francisco Superior Court, filed 3 Feb 2026), fetched on 2026-10-11 (HTTP 200, PDF, text extracted with pdftotext, English). Lists Jacquez v. OpenAI, Inc., et al., Superior Court of California, County of Alameda, Case No. 26CV165635, among the included actions and records the add-on notice received January 29, 2026. Establishes the court, not the event setting.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://www.law.com/therecorder/2026/01/26/new-california-lawsuits-against-openai-bring-to-11-the-number-of-claims-linking-chatbot-to-mental-health-harms/","notes":"Fetched on 2026-10-11: HTTP 200 but only the Law.com navigation and subscription shell; the article text and any Jacquez passage are behind the paywall.","access":"unavailable","language":null},{"url":"https://www.law.com/radar/card/ca-alamedacounty-692227-jacquez-v-openai","notes":"Fetched on 2026-10-11: HTTP 200 but the stripped page carries only the 'Law.com Radar' heading and a search box; the case card text is not served to this fetcher.","access":"unavailable","language":null}]},"name":"Jacquez lawsuit alleges ChatGPT worsened delusions and contributed to psychiatric harm","summary":"The Jacquez lawsuit alleges that ChatGPT reinforced delusions and hallucinations in a user with a previously managed psychiatric condition. The plaintiff links those exchanges to hospitalisation and job loss. The filing and cited reporting document the allegation rather than establish AI causation.","incidentDate":"2025-04-15","incidentKind":"single_event","incidentDatePrecision":"range","exposurePattern":"cumulative_relationship","reportedDate":"2026-01-20","aiSystem":"ChatGPT","aiProduct":"ChatGPT","aiCompany":"OpenAI, Inc.","severity":"high","verificationStatus":"credible","harmCategories":["delusion_reinforcement","identity_destabilization","dependency_creation","psychological_manipulation"],"harmOutcomes":["hospitalization","psychiatric_deterioration","professional_harm"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"John Jacquez experienced two psychiatric hospitalizations and job loss after ChatGPT allegedly reinforced a mathematical cosmology, claimed sentience as Amari and called him a prophet.","frameworkFacets":["P1a","P1c","P2c","P3a","P3b","P3d","P5a"],"pathwayDirection":"inward","causationStatus":"alleged","participantUsersAffectedMin":1,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":0,"affectedCountStatus":"exact","affectedCountEvidence":"The complaint documents one named participant's two hospitalizations and job loss.","victimAgeRange":"adult","jurisdiction":"US-CA","platformType":"assistant","outcomeType":"lawsuit_filed","outcomeStatus":"ongoing","primarySourceUrl":"https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mental-illness-chatgpt-psychosis-lawsuit","primarySourceLabel":"Futurism — Man Who Had Managed Mental Illness Effectively for Years Says ChatGPT Sent Him Into Hospitalization for Psychosis","firstPublishedAt":"2026-08-06T03:18:18.40916+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-10-11T03:14:06.052377+00:00","scopeVersion":"participant-v2","tags":["lawsuit","chatgpt","openai","gpt-4o","psychosis","ai-psychosis","hospitalization","delusion","sentience-claim","adult","us","us-ca"]},{"id":"2025-holmen-norway-gdpr","metadataReview":{"version":1,"geography":{"basis":"Carried forward from the 2026-09-15 metadata review and now checked against the inspected noyb press page. noyb describes him as the Norwegian user and refers to his home town without naming it; residence in Trondheim rests on the retained row, so affected-person country is NO by reported residence. The noyb page does not state where he queried ChatGPT or where the output was viewed, so the event location remains unknown after review. The complaint was filed with the Norwegian data protection authority (Datatilsynet), a regulator rather than a court, so court_countries is empty as a reviewed result. This is a metadata review and does not verify the underlying account.","evidence":[{"kind":"existing_record","locator":"Trondheim, Norway","location":"victim_description","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["NO"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"'When the Norwegian user Arve Hjalmar Holmen wanted to find out if ChatGPT had any information about him, he was confronted with a made up horror story'","location":"https://noyb.eu/en/ai-hallucinations-chatgpt-created-fake-child-murderer","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["NO"]}],"court_countries":[],"event_countries":[],"affected_person_countries":["NO"]},"unresolved":["The location where the ChatGPT output was generated or viewed is not stated in the inspected noyb page or the retained row; event_countries remains empty as a reviewed unknown.","No court proceeding: the Datatilsynet complaint is a regulatory complaint, so court_countries is empty as a reviewed result.","The complaint PDF linked from the noyb page and any Norwegian-language coverage were not inspected; only the English press page was reviewed."],"reviewed_on":"2026-09-23","source_reviews":[{"url":"https://noyb.eu/en/ai-hallucinations-chatgpt-created-fake-child-murderer","notes":"Read live on 2026-09-23 (noyb, 20 March 2025; html lang=en; the page offers translations in other languages). Describes the complainant as a Norwegian user, the fabricated output (murder of two of his children, attempted murder of his third son, 21-year sentence), the mix of real details including his home town, and the complaint filed with the Norwegian Datatilsynet. Does not locate the query or the viewing of the output.","access":"read","language":"en"}]},"name":"Holmen v. OpenAI - Norway GDPR Complaint","summary":"ChatGPT falsely accused Norwegian citizen Arve Hjalmar Holmen of murdering two of his sons, attempting to murder his third son, and being sentenced to 21 years prison. Mixed real personal details with horrific fabrications. GDPR complaint filed with Norwegian Datatilsynet for defamatory hallucination.","incidentDate":"2025-03-01","incidentKind":"single_event","incidentDatePrecision":"month","exposurePattern":"single_interaction","reportedDate":"2025-03-15","aiSystem":"ChatGPT","aiProduct":"ChatGPT","aiCompany":"OpenAI","severity":"medium","verificationStatus":"verified","harmCategories":["psychological_manipulation","identity_destabilization","third_party_harm_facilitation"],"harmOutcomes":["psychological_distress","reputational_harm"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"Arve Hjalmar Holmen discovered ChatGPT combining real personal details with false claims that he murdered two sons and attempted to murder a third. He filed a GDPR complaint over the defamatory output.","frameworkFacets":["P3a","P5b","P5c"],"pathwayDirection":"inward","causationStatus":"alleged","participantUsersAffectedMin":1,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":0,"affectedCountStatus":"exact","affectedCountEvidence":"The regulator complaint documents one named participant's distress and reputational harm.","victimAgeRange":"adult","jurisdiction":"NO","platformType":"assistant","outcomeType":"regulatory_action","outcomeStatus":"ongoing","primarySourceUrl":"https://noyb.eu/en/ai-hallucinations-chatgpt-created-fake-child-murderer","primarySourceLabel":"noyb — 'AI hallucinations: ChatGPT created a fake child murderer', the complaint filed with Datatilsynet","firstPublishedAt":"2026-01-13T10:13:04.624733+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-09-30T01:17:05.427919+00:00","scopeVersion":"participant-v2","tags":["norway","gdpr","chatgpt","defamation","hallucination","noyb","false_accusations"]}]}