--- title: "OpenAI Locks Down Office After Violent Threat" description: "A former activist with the group StopAI has reportedly gone missing after making violent threats against OpenAI employees." date: "2025-11-25" modified: "2025-11-25" authors: - name: "Joe Wilkins" job_title: "Correspondent" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jwilkins" url: "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/openai-lockdown-threat" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Ethics" --- # OpenAI Locks Down Office After Violent Threat ![A former activist with the group StopAI has reportedly gone missing after making violent threats against OpenAI employees.]() *Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism* With so much doomsaying over the existential threat of AI — nevermind its toll on [environmental](), [economic](), and [mental health]() — it was perhaps only a matter of time before heated rhetoric spilled out of the internet and into the real world. Case in point, OpenAI reportedly locked down its offices in San Francisco after it allegedly received a violent threat from an anti-AI diehard. "Our information indicates that \[an activist\] from StopAI has expressed interest in causing physical harm to OpenAI employees," an OpenAI employee wrote on Slack, [according to *Wired*](). "He has previously been on site at our San Francisco facilities." Though *Wired* didn't identify the individual by name, the [publication *City Journal*]() later reported that the group StopAI — an activist organization struggling for a permanent ban on AI development — posted a lengthy statement indicating it may be Sam Kirchner, one of the group's cofounders. In its statement, StopAI distanced itself from Kirchner, stressing the group is "deeply committed to nonviolence." Just before OpenAI went into lockdown, Kirchner [posted on social media]() that he is "no longer part of StopAI." Per *CJ*, Kirchner's present whereabouts are unknown. It also isn't clear yet if Kirchner was the same activist making the threats, though StopAI claimed that the cofounder had assaulted another member of the group who "refused to give \[Kirchner\] access to funds" prior to OpenAI's lockdown. "His volatile, erratic behavior and statements he made renouncing nonviolence caused the victim of his assault to fear that he might procure a weapon that he could use against employees of companies pursuing artificial superintelligence," the group wrote. StopAI organizers have previously coordinated [hunger strikes]() in front of various AI company offices. Earlier this month, the group also claimed responsibility after an attorney from the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office served OpenAI CEO [Sam Altman a subpoena]() to appear as a witness in a criminal case. **More on AI:** *[Protesters Swarm OpenAI]()* ## Author At Futurism, I focus on the intersection of technology and power — examining the economics, history, and politics behind today’s dystopian headlines. As a writer, I’m interested in topics ranging from AI’s impact on labor to startups nobody asked for. My prior work includes bylines in Jacobin, Verso, and Blue Labyrinths. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Forbes, The Guardian, MIT Technology Review, Time, The Nation, Mother Jones, The Verge, and Wired. I grew up in Michigan, attending Central Michigan University as well as Ball State University, where I earned a master of music. I now live in Brooklyn with my girlfriend and our cat Ziti. On weekends, you can find me hunched over a cold pint arguing geopolitics with the other transplants. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()