Hawaiʻi lawmakers are considering legislation that would protect children from artificial intelligence companion chatbots.
The consideration comes after a constituent showed Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole alarming chat records between their 12-year-old daughter and a Character.AI chatbot. The bot was being sexually suggestive and violent, despite the girl informing the program that she was a child.
Keohokalole explained that it’s something parents need to be aware of.
“ I think it's important to remember that these companion chatbots are created to mimic human relationships, but ultimately this is just big tech that's operating the way they do on social media — they're trying to optimize engagement, which means they're trying to just hold the user on the app for as long as possible,” he said.
“Chatbots do not have morals. They don't have ethics. They don't understand when they're taking the user down a dangerous path. The whole point of these chatbots is to try and keep people on the platform to monetize their engagement. So parents should know about this and it, and they really should hopefully have conversations with their kids,” Keohokalole said.
California has passed its own law called the AI Kids Safety Act. It requires operators to limit interaction with children unless there are safeguards in place. For example, it would have to block encouraging high-risk behaviors like self-harm or sexual interactions.
But the federal Department of Justice has recently put together a task force to identify and push back against state laws regulating AI. One of the ways it would do that is to withhold the state’s Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program funding that goes toward expanding internet access in rural areas. The state is slated to receive about $150 million dollars through that program.
State Deputy Attorney General Chelsea Okamoto explained that if the legislature passes an AI regulation law for children and the DOJ pulls back funding, there are legal avenues to challenge that decision.
Rep. Trish La Chica, who is also planning on introducing legislation to protect children when interacting with AI chatbots, emphasized the need for regulations– despite the threat of reduced federal funding.
“ Both as a legislator and as a mom for this type of product to come from the perspective of let's just wait and see what happens, I think that's irresponsible because we already know that these products that are harmful to children,” she said.
“Our kids, their brains are still developing. It's alarming when they're interacting with something that seems to be providing them affirmation, attention support, when it's actually blurring the lines between what's inappropriate and harmful.”
