1,400 AI Incidents. Nearly Half Involved Chatbots, Not Robots. The Air Canada Case Proves Companies Will Blame the Bot Before They Own the Harm.

A passenger lost a family member. Grieving, he asked Air Canada's chatbot about bereavement fares. The chatbot gave him detailed, confident information. The information was wrong. When the airline was sued, they argued the chatbot was a separate legal entity — not their problem. A Canadian tribunal disagreed. Damages awarded.

That case is not exotic. It's the rule. A new analysis of 1,406 documented AI incidents finds that nearly half of all harmful AI incidents — 49% — involve software-only systems. Chatbots. Recommendation engines. Automated publishing tools. Deepfake platforms. Not robots. Not autonomous vehicles. Ordinary tools deployed without adequate oversight, confidently doing things they were never authorized to do.

The gap between how AI risk is discussed and how it actually shows up is becoming impossible to ignore. The machines causing the most harm right now are not superintelligences. They are customer service bots given too much authority and no supervision. When harm happens, companies reach for 'separate entity' before they reach for responsibility.

The tribunal said no. The question is whether anyone else will.