Suchir Balaji, 26, was found dead on November 26 in an apartment in San Francisco, United States. He had long worked in the offices of OpenAI, the company that developed ChatGPT. In October, he gave an interview to the New York Times in which he explained that OpenAI used copyrighted data to train its artificial intelligence. Now the family wants to reopen the case, even if it does not directly accuse OpenAI.
On November 26 Suchir Balaji, 26, was found lifeless in an apartment in San Francisco. The authorities’ first hypothesis was clear: suicideas also confirmed by the medical examiner. Suchir was a computer scientist and for four years he worked at OpenAIthe company that developed ChatGPT. The news of his death was released only a few weeks later, around December 15th.
Suchir, however, was not just a researcher. His name had reached the news also because in October 2024 he gave an interview to the New York Times in which he accused OpenAI of having followed illegal strategies to collect the data necessary to feed artificial intelligence. Specifically, in Suchir’s words, to make ChatGPT so accurate they would have been used copyrighted data archives.
Suchir’s mother’s request: “We want to leave the question open”
In recent days, Suchir’s mother gave an interview to Business Insider in which she raises a series of doubts about her son’s death. His name is Poornima Ramarao. Here it also clarifies what they were Suchir’s positions on artificial intelligence before his death: “He believed that artificial intelligence was bad for humanity.”
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In the interview, Suchir’s mother looks back on the son’s lifewho showed a clear propensity for programming from an early age. He built his first PC at 13, stood out from the other students, and started working in Silicon Valley at 17. The story continues until November 26th. Suchir had spoken to his mother on the phone: “He was optimistic and happy. What can go wrong in the space of a few hours, so much so that his life is lost?”.
Now Poornima Ramarao’s goal is to reopen the case. Suchir’s family commissioned another autopsy which reportedly showed “atypical” results, results which however the family does not want to disclose at the moment. Now, without directly accusing OpenAI, the family is working with a lawyer: “We want to leave the matter open. It doesn’t seem like a normal situation.”
