A bill attempting to regulate the ever-growing industry of companion AI chatbots is now law in California, as of October 13th.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law Senate Bill 243, billed as “first-in-the-nation AI chatbot safeguards” by state senator Anthony Padilla. The new law requires that companion chatbot developers implement new safeguards — for instance, “if a reasonable person interacting with a companion chatbot would be misled to believe that the person is interacting with a human,” then the new law requires the chatbot maker to “issue a clear and conspicuous notification” that the product is strictly AI and not human.

Starting next year, the legislation would require some companion chatbot operators to make annual reports to the Office of Suicide Prevention about safe

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