It started quietly, with a handful of posts on tech forums and Reddit explaining why and how you should uninstall and unsubscribe from ChatGPT. Now the #QuitGPT campaign has more than 4 million participants around the world and the numbers continue to increase. FRANCE 24 technology journalist Charlotte Lam tells us more.
The #QuitGPT campaign initially gained momentum in the US, fueled by two complaints: a substantial donation made by OpenAI president Greg Brockman to pro-Trump super PAC MAGA Inc., and reports that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) uses a detection tool powered by ChatGPT-4. But it was that recent agreement with the White House that boosted the campaign worldwide.
On February 28, OpenAI signed an agreement to deploy its AI models on the Pentagon’s classified network, just hours after its main rival, Anthropic, publicly refused to do so. Anthropic, the company behind the Claude chatbot, said it could not in good conscience accept terms that would allow mass surveillance or fully autonomous weapons.
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The #QuitGPT website claims that more than four million people have taken action, without providing further details. More to the point, Forbes reported earlier this month that 1.5 million people left the platform immediately following the Pentagon deal, and mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower also recorded an increase of around 295 percent in ChatGPT app uninstalls above the usual daily base.
There is always the question about the secret number (of people participating in a boycott necessary to see change),” American University professor Dana Fisher, who specializes in activism, told FRANCE 24.
“The number has to be very high – It must be proportional to the number of users there are. For AI companies, what matters is the degree to which these rejections are experienced and the way in which people reject them. If companies see this in their results, and that is what the #QuitGPT campaign is about – get people to commit to using AI less and even canceling subscriptions – That will matter.”
She added: “We know that consumer actions and campaigns can be really effective in getting companies to change their policies. Although I’m not sure their request is really feasible, in the sense that these companies are not going away. The transition to making AI part of our daily lives: that train has left the station.”
Fisher, quoted in MIT Technology Review’s coverage of the campaign, said the real test was whether online action translates into material consequences.
“This seems to be reaching more people in a new way: (Hollywood actor) Mark Ruffalo signed on to help the campaign a couple of weeks ago and that has really helped attract more attention,” he said.
“But for me, it will be more telling when we see people who aren’t the ones who always stand up, stand up and take notice. We haven’t seen that yet.”
Ethics is now a competitive advantage in the AI race – and Anthropic may be proving it. The company gained market share not by launching a product or a marketing campaign, but by turning down a contract.
Meanwhile, cracks are showing in OpenAI. Despite the billions in revenue, some technology analysts project that the company will lose $14 billion by the end of 2026. ChatGPT will also receive advertising. – something CEO Sam Altman once called a “last resort.” Following public backlash over the deal with the Pentagon, which he admitted was “opportunistic” and “sloppy,” the CEO announced that the company would add language to its agreement with the White House that would explicitly prohibit its systems from being used to spy on Americans.
Fisher also told FRANCE 24 that he was hesitant to make direct comparisons of #QuitGPT to past boycotts, noting that many high-profile online campaigns, including the viral movement to stop Project Willow in Alaska, which trended on TikTok with millions of posts, ultimately failed to produce real-world change.
“Then there was also the campaign to boycott Spotify when they were running ads to recruit people to work for ICE. – “It’s basically the same technique, and it appears to have worked, gaining momentum in late 2025,” he said. “But this campaign is not that different. What we are seeing is that people from all walks of life and stages of life are attracting attention, which is new. But the campaign and the petition itself are not unique.”
#QuitGPT organizers are actively directing people toward their competitors: Anthropic’s Claude, Google’s Gemini, and open source alternatives. Discussions about AI guardrails and corporate responsibility have long been limited to academics and experts, but more and more are reaching the mainstream.
As Fisher says, the campaign matters not just for what it’s asking people to do, but also for the systemic conversation it’s forcing: “What tends to get lost when we focus on a specific tool like ChatGPT is the way it represents a broader shift, the ways in which tech companies are leaning toward AI in ways whose consequences are extremely material.”
FRANCE 24 has contacted OpenAI for comment.
