Meta pauses teen access to AI characters ahead of new version

Meta said today that it is temporarily pausing teen access to its AI characters globally across all of its apps. The company is not abandoning its efforts but wants to develop an updated version of its AI characters for teens, the company exclusively told TechCrunch.

The move comes days before a case against Meta goes to trial in New Mexico, accusing the company of not making an effort to protect children from sexual exploitation on its apps. Wired reported Thursday that Meta sought to limit findings about social media’s impact on teens’ mental health.

In October, the company previewed parental controls for AI characters, allowing 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 rolled out parental control features on Instagram, with a focus on tailoring 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 aforementioned case in New Mexico, Meta is also facing trial next week, where the platform is 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, banned open conversations with chatbots for users under 18. In November, the startup said it would build interactive stories for children. In the past few months, OpenAI has added new teen safety rules to ChatGPT and has begun predicting a 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.