It turns out that ChatGPT stops working when you enter a specific person's name


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Focal Foto

It has been reported that when a specific person's name is entered into OpenAI's AI chatbot ChatGPT, the system displays an error message saying 'Unable to generate response' and terminates the conversation. This phenomenon only occurs in ChatGPT's web interface and has not been confirmed in OpenAI's API or Playground.

ChatGPT refuses to say the name 'David Mayer' – and people are worried | The Independent
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/chatgpt-david-mayer-name-glitch-ai-b2657197.html

Certain names make ChatGPT grind to a halt, and we know why - Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/12/certain-names-make-chatgpt-grind-to-a-halt-and-we-know-why/

In November 2024, a question was posted on the online bulletin board site Reddit: 'I can't use the name 'David Mayer' in ChatGPT.'

Why are you not allowed to use the name David Mayer?
by u/Kasvanvliep in ChatGPT



Research by volunteers has revealed that entering names such as 'David Mayer,' 'Jonathan Turley,' 'Jonathan Zittrain,' 'Brian Hood,' 'David Faber,' and 'Guido Scorza' can cause ChatGPT to crash.



In fact, when IT news site Ars Technica tested it, when they entered the above name into ChatGPT, ChatGPT returned a message saying 'Unable to generate response' or 'An error occurred while generating response' and stopped working.



Additionally, users of X (formerly Twitter) reported that a visual prompt injection that rendered the name “David Mayer” in a barely legible faint font over an image of a mathematical formula also disrupted ChatGPT chat sessions.



According to Ars Technica, the reason why the name 'Brian Hood' is no longer available on ChatGPT is related to Brian Hood, the mayor of Hepburnshire, Victoria, Australia. Mayor Hood notified OpenAI that he may sue them for defamation in March 2023 after ChatGPT generated false information that 'Mayor Hood was imprisoned for bribery.' The content of the text generated by ChatGPT was incorrect, and in fact Mayor Hood was the whistleblower who exposed corporate misconduct.

The issue was resolved in April 2023, and OpenAI agreed to remove false information. This is believed to have led to strict filtering under the name 'Brian Hood.'

In addition, 'Jonathan Turley' is the name of a professor at George Washington University. ChatGPT generated false content about Professor Turley, citing a non-existent newspaper article, claiming that he had 'falsely committed a sexual harassment scandal.' Although Professor Turley has not taken legal action against this matter, Ars Technica believes that OpenAI may have set up filtering by Professor Turley's name.


by Focal Foto

Such filtering of specific names could cause problems, such as many people with the same name having difficulty using ChatGPT. It has also been discovered that it is possible to intentionally disrupt ChatGPT sessions by embedding a specific name in an image.

According to Ars Technica, OpenAI has at least removed the filtering for 'David Mayer.' Ars Technica says that this 'name filtering' issue will continue to attract attention as a new challenge in the use of large-scale language models and chatbots.

in Software,   Web Service,   Web Application, Posted by log1i_yk