Exclusive: Grieving parents push Congress to crack down on AI chatbots
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Families who say chatbots harmed their children are urging Congress to pass strict safeguards, arguing that tech companies have put profits ahead of kids' safety.
Why it matters: Lawmakers are weighing how aggressively to crack down on AI chatbots for kids.
Driving the news: Parents are calling on the chairs and co-chairs of the Senate Judiciary and Commerce committees to advance tough protections, per a letter shared exclusively with Axios.
- The letter to Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) was sent ahead of a Thursday markup of the GUARD Act, a bipartisan bill led by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.).
- It also comes days after Cruz and Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) introduced a separate proposal, the CHATBOT Act.
- The parents — Matt and Maria Raine, Megan Garcia, and Mandi Furniss — will be in attendance at Thursday's markup.
What they're saying: "For us, this issue is not abstract. Big Tech deliberately designed their products and platforms to addict, manipulate, exploit, and abuse children and teens," the parents wrote in the letter, which hundreds of others signed onto.
The big picture: AI companies are facing increasing legal scrutiny over how their tools interact with minors and vulnerable users.
- Parents are also worried about what AI and tech tools are doing to their kids' educations and social and critical thinking skills.
How it works: Hawley's bill would ban chatbots from interacting with kids under 18. It would also require bots to disclose that they're not human or licensed professionals, and create criminal penalties for companies that expose kids to sexual content via chatbots.
- The Cruz-Schatz bill takes a narrower approach, and would require AI companies to build "family accounts" so parents can control how kids use chatbots.
- That legislation would also add privacy protections, limit manipulative features and ban targeted ads to minors.
The survivor families, including those who testified before the Senate about their children last year, wrote that they don't want to see their preferred approach bumped in favor of weaker alternatives.
- Without naming the Cruz-Schatz bill directly, they said: "As opposed to other proposals that seek to implement the bare minimum safeguards Big Tech is willing to support, or proposals that seek to place most of the burdens on kids and parents to keep kids safe, the GUARD Act creates meaningful, tangible protections for kids."
What we're watching: Both the Judiciary and Commerce committees are trying to tackle the issue of chatbots and minors.
- The Commerce Committee approach from Cruz and Schatz so far has received a thumbs-up from OpenAI.
Between the lines: If more AI companies come out in support of the Cruz-Schatz bill, it could reinforce parents' concerns that it's a weaker, tech-backed bill that doesn't go far enough.
- "As the Senate considers multiple proposals to protect children and teens online, we ask you to think about families like ours," the parents wrote. "When Big Tech comes for our children, parents are the ones left to pick up the pieces."
