{"slug": "openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead", "title": "OpenAI loses its AI ethics lead", "summary": "OpenAI has lost its AI ethics lead Chloé Bakalar just a year after she joined, according to the Financial Times. Bakalar, who previously developed ethics programs at Meta, focused on ethical model development and machine consciousness during her tenure. Her departure adds to a wave of executive exits, including robotics chief Caitlin Kalinowski and safety systems head Johannes Heidecke, amid scrutiny over OpenAI's ethical stance and its preparations for an IPO.", "body_md": "OpenAI has lost its AI ethics lead Chloé Bakalar just a year after she joined the company, the [Financial Times reported](https://www.ft.com/content/e49dfb75-f841-4466-a577-f7aaff8779a0). Bakalar has maintained a silence and has yet to update her [LinkedIn profile](https://www.linkedin.com/in/chlo%C3%A9-bakalar-21511163/), but if her departure is confirmed then it will add to the list of OpenAI executives who have quit in recent months.\n\nOther departures include [robotics chief Caitlin Kalinowski](https://www.computerworld.com/article/4142366/openai-robotics-chief-quits-over-pentagon-deal.html), who left the company over its deal with the US Department of Defense; researcher Zoe Hitzig, who quit in a very public way by writing an article in the New York Times; and [Johannes Heidecke,](https://www.reddit.com/r/InterstellarKinetics/comments/1utzsn5/breaking_openais_head_of_safety_systems_johannes/) head of safety systems.\n\nOpenAI’s ethical stance has been called into question following an [attack by OpenAI models on Hugging Face](https://www.csoonline.com/article/4200043/openai-model-escape-puts-enterprise-ai-defenses-on-notice.html).\n\nThe departure of its sole ethicist will add to the pressure on the company. In her year at OpenAI Bakalar focused on ethical approaches to model development, looking at how humans interact with AI and examining machine consciousness, according to the FT report.\n\nBakalar had considerable expertise in the area. She was previously at Meta, where she developed the company’s ethics programs, but has also held several positions at prestigious universities on both sides of the Atlantic. Her departure will cause some anxiety at OpenAI as it [continues to prepare the ground for its IPO](https://www.cio.com/article/4181090/what-anthropic-and-openai-ipos-spell-for-cios-ai-budgets.html).\n\n*This article first appeared on Computerworld.*", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead", "canonical_source": "https://www.cio.com/article/4209804/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead-2.html", "published_at": "2026-08-14 13:22:31+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-14 13:37:49.473805+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-ethics", "ai-policy", "artificial-intelligence"], "entities": ["OpenAI", "Chloé Bakalar", "Financial Times", "Meta", "Caitlin Kalinowski", "Johannes Heidecke", "Hugging Face", "US Department of Defense"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/openai-loses-its-ai-ethics-lead.jsonld"}}