Minister says AI safety institute now looking at OpenAI protocols

OTTAWA — Canada’s AI safety institute has now gained access to all of OpenAI’s “protocols,” Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon said Friday.

Solomon added the AI Safety Institute is working on a report and promised that “we will get accountability.”

Solomon met with the CEO of OpenAI in March after news emerged that the company had banned the mass shooter in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., from using its ChatGPT chatbot due to worrisome interactions — but did not alert law enforcement.

The shooter got around the ChatGPT ban by having a second account.

Jesse Van Rootselaar fatally shot eight people in Tumbler Ridge on Feb. 10, including six children, before killing herself.

Solomon said that during the meeting, he told OpenAI representatives that all options are on the table and they must “protect our children or the hammer comes down.”

Following the March meeting, the government said Solomon would ask the Canadian AI Safety Institute to examine the company’s model and provide expert technical advice to his office.

Following his meeting with OpenAI officials, Soloman said they promised to take a number of measures — including providing a report outlining new systems the company is developing to identify high-risk offenders and policy violators, establishing a direct point of contact with the RCMP and implementing safety protocols to direct people “experiencing distress” to appropriate local services.

Solomon made the comments about the AI Safety Institute while speaking about the government’s promised online harms bill at the Liberal party policy convention in Montreal on Friday. He did not directly state whether that legislation will cover AI chatbots.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 10, 2026.

— With files from Wolfgang Depner