Penn State student charged with impersonating a police officer with the help of AI chatbot
.JPG)
A Penn State student was charged Thursday with impersonating a public servant after university police said he used an artificial intelligence text chatbot to compose messages he then sent to a woman.
Isaiah H. Goldman, 21, falsely pretended to be a university police officer by telling a woman he knew to immediately contact him and asking her investigatory questions, a Penn State police officer wrote in an affidavit of probable cause.
A message left Monday for defense lawyer Phillip O. Robertson was not immediately returned. A staffer who answered a phone call from the Centre Daily Times said Robertson was out of the office Monday.
A Penn State spokesman told the Centre Daily Times on Monday the university is “aware of these serious charges.” Goldman is prohibited from campus and all university events, programs and activities.
“The Office of Student Accountability and Conflict Response will review the allegations of misconduct and determine appropriate next steps,” the spokesman wrote in an email. “The university may take student conduct action in addition to, and separate from, the charges filed by police.”
The messages began in February when Goldman sent the woman a text that read “*Urgent Notice from Penn State Police*.” She believed the message could be legitimate because she was involved in a university police investigation a week prior, police wrote.
Goldman then said “we strongly encourage you to cooperate” and falsely made claims that her failure to comply would lead to university sanctions such as “delays in your future graduation,” police wrote.
Penn State police detectives searched Goldman’s cellphone and said they found he was using ChatGPT to compose the messages that were sent to the woman. Investigators said they found screenshots of the inputs he submitted, as well as the chatbot’s responses.
The misdemeanor charge was issued Thursday by summons. Goldman’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for May 21.
This story was originally published April 28, 2025 at 2:52 PM.