‘Sexualized’ AI Chatbots Pose Threat to Kids, Warn Attorneys General in Letter

The Nationwide Affiliation of Attorneys Common (NAAG) has written to 13 AI corporations, together with OpenAI, Anthropic, Apple and Meta, demanding stronger safeguards to guard youngsters from inappropriate and dangerous content material.

It warned that youngsters had been being uncovered to sexually suggestive materials by “flirty” AI chatbots.

“Exposing youngsters to sexualized content material is indefensible,” the attorneys generals wrote. “And conduct that may be illegal—and even legal—if performed by people just isn’t excusable just because it’s performed by a machine.”

The letter additionally drew comparisons to the rise of social media, saying authorities businesses did not do sufficient to spotlight the methods it negatively impacted youngsters.

“Social media platforms brought on important hurt to youngsters, partially as a result of authorities watchdogs didn’t do their job quick sufficient. Lesson realized. The potential harms of AI, just like the potential advantages, dwarf the affect of social media,” the group wrote.

Using AI amongst youngsters is widespread. Within the U.S., a survey by non-profit Widespread Sense Media found seven in ten youngsters had tried generative AI as of 2024. In July 2025, it found greater than three-quarters had been utilizing AI companions and that half of the respondents stated they relied on them usually.

Different nations have seen comparable tendencies. Within the UK, a survey final yr by regulator Ofcom found that half of on-line 8-15 yr olds had used a generative AI device within the earlier yr.

The rising use of those instruments has sparked mounting concern from dad and mom, faculties and youngsters’s rights teams, who level to dangers starting from sexually suggestive “flirty” chatbots, AI-generated baby sexual abuse materials, bullying, grooming, extortion, disinformation, privateness breaches and poorly understood mental health impacts.

Meta has come below explicit hearth just lately after leaked inside paperwork revealed its AI Assistants had been allowed to “flirt and interact in romantic function play with youngsters,” together with these as younger as eight. The recordsdata additionally confirmed insurance policies allowing chatbots to inform youngsters their “youthful kind is a murals” and describe them as a “treasure.” Meta later stated it had eliminated these pointers.

NAAG stated the revelations left attorneys common “revolted by this obvious disregard for kids’s emotional well-being” and warned that dangers weren’t restricted to Meta.

The group cited lawsuits towards Google and Character.ai alleging that sexualized chatbots had contributed to an adolescent’s suicide and inspired one other to kill his dad and mom.

Among the many 44 signatories was Tennessee Legal professional Common Jonathan Skrmetti, who said corporations can not defend insurance policies that normalise sexualised interactions with minors.

“It’s one factor for an algorithm to go astray—that may be fastened—nevertheless it’s one other for individuals operating an organization to undertake pointers that affirmatively authorize grooming,” he stated. “If we will’t steer innovation away from hurting youngsters, that’s not progress—it’s a plague.”

Decrypt has contacted however not but heard again from all the AI corporations talked about within the letter.