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Meta said today that it is temporarily pausing teen access to its AI characters globally across all of its apps. The company said it is not abandoning its efforts, but wants to develop an updated version of AI characters for teens, the company exclusively told TechCrunch.
This move comes days before the start of the trial in a case against Meta in New Mexico, where the company is accused of not making an effort to protect children from sexual exploitation on its applications. Wired reported on Thursday that Meta sought to limit revelations about the impact of social media on teens’ mental health, along with stories
In October, The company previewed the controls for the AI charactersThis allows parents and guardians to monitor topics and block access to certain characters. Parents will be able to turn off conversations with AI characters entirely, Meta said. These features were scheduled to launch this year, but the company is now turning off AI characters completely for teens while it updates the AI characters to a newer version.
Meta said she heard from parents that they wanted more insight and control over their teens’ interactions with AI characters, which is why she decided to make these changes.
The company has cracked down on teens accessing AI content in its apps. Also in October, Meta was launched Parental control features on Instagram, with a focus on designing teens’ experience of interacting with AI on its apps. These features, inspired by the film’s PG-13 rating, restricted teens’ access to certain themes such as extreme violence, nudity, and graphic drug use.
“Starting in the coming weeks, teens will no longer be able to access AI personalities across our apps until the updated experience is ready. This will apply to anyone who has given us a teen’s birthday, as well as people who claim to be adults but we suspect are teens based on our age prediction technology,” the company said in an updated blog post.
Meta added that when the new AI characters are released, they will have built-in parental controls. The company said the new characters will provide age-appropriate responses and will stick to themes such as education, sports and hobbies.
Social media companies are under intense scrutiny by regulators. Aside from the case mentioned above in New Mexico, Meta He also faces trial next weekThe platform was accused of causing social media addiction. CEO Mark Zuckerberg is expected to take the witness stand in this case once the trial begins.
Along with social platforms, AI companies have had to adjust their experience for teens after facing lawsuits alleging they play a role in aiding self-harm. In October, Character.AI, a startup that allows users to chat with various AI avatars, was banned. Open conversations with chatbots for users under 18 years of age. In November, the startup said it would do so Building interactive stories for children. OpenAI has been added in the past few months New teen safety rules in ChatGPT And I started too Predict the user’s age to apply content restrictions.
Correction: This post has been updated to clarify that the new version of the AI characters will be accessible to everyone, not just teens, when it launches. It will include parental controls.