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When OpenAI announced its latest ChatGPT last week, the AI voice it used in its demo was quickly compared to Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 sci-fi film “Her,” but now the company says it is pulling the voice.

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Leon Bennett/Getty Images

When OpenAI announced its latest ChatGPT last week, the AI voice it used in its demo was quickly compared to Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 sci-fi film “Her,” but now the company says it is pulling the voice.

Leon Bennett/Getty Images

OpenAI is pulling an AI assistant voice for the latest version of ChatGPT that drew comparisons to the voice of actress Scarlett Johansson in the sci-fi romantic drama “Her,” which centered on a man who falls in love with the female voice of his computer’s operating system.

The company said in a post on X that the voice would be paused as it addresses “questions about how we chose the voices in ChatGPT.” A company spokeswoman would not provide further detail.

In a blog post published just before midnight Pacific time Sunday, OpenAI said the AI voice in question, known as “Sky,” was developed from the voice of another actress whose identity the company said it is not revealing to protect her privacy.

“We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity’s distinctive voice — Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice,” the company wrote.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who has said the 2013 Spike Jonze film is his favorite movie, invited comparisons by posting the word “Her” on X after the company announced the ChatGPT version.

The new model, known as GPT-4o, transforms the hit chatbot into a voice assistant that can interpret facial expressions, detect emotion and even sing on command.

The new voice assistant will be publicly available in the coming weeks. During a live-demo last week, it struck a knowing, flirtatious tone with some of OpenAI’s employees, leading some to wonder whether the coquettish demeanor was an intentional ploy to keep people engaged with the AI system.

A publicist for Scarlett Johansson did not have immediate comment.

In an interview with NPR last week, OpenAI chief technology officer Mira Murati said the company did not pattern any ChatGPT voices on Johansson’s sultry computer voice in the movie.

“It says more about our imagination, our storytelling as a society than about the technology itself,” Murati said. “The way we developed this technology is not based on the movie or a sci-fi story. We’re trying to build these machines that can think and have robust understandings of the world.”

“I don’t know about the voice. I actually had to go and listen to Scarlett Johansson’s voice,” she said.

Asked about ChatGPT’s flirtatious banter, Murati said the model merely responds to what people provide to it.

“It will react to how you’re interacting with it,” she said. “It’s not preset. It’s based on inputs,” Murati said.

In its Sunday night blog post, OpenAI said that chatbot was developed with five voices that were produced after working closely with voice and screen actors.

“Looking ahead, you can expect even more options as we plan to introduce additional voices in ChatGPT to better match the diverse interests and preferences of users,” the company wrote in the post.

A day after OpenAI’s announcement, Google held its annual developer conference where it unveiled its own personal AI assistant, also voiced by a female, known as Project Astra. While similar, Google’s version appeared far less quippy and playful and more matter of fact.

Together, experts say, the products provide a glimpse into the next generation of cutting-edge AI technology — and also raise questions about the risks that follow as more and more people adopt the tools.

Visar Berisha, an Arizona State University professor who studies AI speech technology, said it is hard to predict how advanced AI voice assistants that speak with human-like personalities will change society.

“Communication by voice is really intimate, really impactful. It allows the AI to express subtleties, things that are perceived as sincere, urgent, joy, concern,” he said. “And all of these serve to foster a deeper connection between the user and machine. You can see how these interactions can potentially become addictive.”

It’s possible, Berisha said, that people will start forming emotional connections to AI systems, much like the plot of “Her” — a movie that does not end happily for the protagonist.

“When I first saw that movie it seemed like science fiction,” Berisha said. “It doesn’t seem like that now.”