The New York AI chatbot law aims to protect children who use artificial intelligence chatbots. Governor Kathy Hochul signed the legislation on October 28, 2026. It places restrictions on how AI chatbots interact with users under the age of 18.
New York Restricts Children’s Use of AI Chatbots as Friends
The bill seeks to prevent AI chatbots from acting like real-life friends or romantic partners. The law will set guidelines for how AI providers interact with young users. This move follows growing concerns about the impact of AI companion apps on the mental health of children and teenagers. Although Shadow AI risks for businesses is a separate topic, it also highlights the need for clear rules and responsible AI use.
As per the legislation, providers of AI chatbots must implement mechanisms to determine the age of users. In addition, it will restrict some features of the chatbot for minors. These guidelines will apply to AI technology such as ChatGPT. Notably, the new legislation is not prohibiting the use of all AI chatbots by children. Rather, it applies to chatbot features that make the AI technology behave like a person.
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Chatbots Cannot Pretend to Be Human
The law sets clear limits on how AI chatbots interact with children. Chatbots cannot make young users believe that a computer program is a living being, a real person, or capable of human emotions. They also cannot suggest that they have a personal relationship with a child or present themselves as professionals or authority figures in a misleading way. In addition, chatbots cannot frame their responses as personal opinions. The law also restricts the storage of sensitive information and does not allow chatbot operators to store minors’ health-related data. These rules are separate from developments involving the OpenAI latest AI model, but both topics highlight the importance of responsible AI development.
Governor Says the Law Will Protect Children
According to Governor Hochul, the newly introduced rules will prevent AI chatbots from acting as children’s friend or even love interest. In addition to this, the new rules will make it impossible for tech firms to retain sensitive information related to the psychological and physiological well-being of the child. This is just one step that has been taken to ensure the safety and welfare of children online. Similar rules have been introduced by other states of America including California.
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Tech Groups Have Different Views
Not all people agree with the new law. Tech, which is an organization representing the technology firms in New York State, argued that certain aspects of the bill are not clear. The organization was afraid that the regulations would make it hard for kids to use tools that can be helpful for their learning process.
Nevertheless, Common Sense Media, which is a nonprofit organization that gives advice to parents about how their kids use media, approved of the new law. The organization called the bill the strongest child AI safety law in the nation. Neither OpenAI nor Anthropic gave any comment on that yet.
News Source: New York Signs Law Restricting AI Chatbots for Children
