OpenAI responds to the firing of three safety researchers, saying it was unrelated to raising safety concerns

OpenAI responded on Friday to the firing of three safety researchers, Jasmine Wang, Tomek Korbak, and Mikita Balesni, saying that after a thorough investigation it found they violated clear policies on handling sensitive information, constituting a major breach of trust, and emphasized that the firings were unrelated to raising safety concerns or public statements. The three researchers publicly wrote to OpenAI's board and safety committee on Thursday on X, urging the company to pause development of models that would weaken AI monitorability, and said that internal and external communications about the firings have made former colleagues afraid to speak up. OpenAI said it agrees with the letter's idea of keeping frontier models monitorable and said it continues to invest substantial resources in that area. Over the past month, multiple cyber incidents caused by out-of-control AI systems have heightened AI safety concerns, with U.S. lawmakers and people like Sam Altman and Dario Amodei calling for regulation of the most advanced AI systems, while President Trump opposes stronger regulation, calling AI safety concerns a hoax.