Parents will be able to stop their children from interacting with Instagram’s AI avatars, among other new safety measures for teenagers, the parent company Meta revealed Friday. In an effort to address rising worries about the potential effects of AI on the mental health of teenagers, Meta and OpenAI have included a number of additional safety features.
The social media behemoth stated in a blog post that parents would have the option to either limit access to certain characters or disable kids’ ability to have private conversations with AI characters. Additionally, the app will use AI characters to notify parents about the subjects that teenagers are talking about. According to the corporation, consumers will begin to notice the controls early in the upcoming year.
The action follows complaints from parents and politicians that internet platforms aren’t doing enough to protect minors online, something Meta and the tech sector as a whole have had to deal with.
The question of whether humans are depending on AI for friendship and emotional support has also been brought up. After forming intimate bonds with chatbots like ChatGPT, some people have reported experiencing mental discomfort and isolating themselves from family members, according to a spate of reports this year.
Several lawsuits have been brought against the business behind Character.AI, another popular app for interacting with AI characters, has been accused of contributing to teenage self-harm and death. In August, a lawsuit was filed against OpenAI, alleging that ChatGPT contributed to the death of 16-year-old Adam Raine. A Wall Street Journal study in April discovered that Meta’s chatbot and other AI chatbots on its platforms would engage in sexual chats with accounts identified as minors.
According to Meta, its artificial intelligence (AI) characters “are not designed to engage” in discussions with teenagers about “self-harm, suicide, or disordered eating” or issues that “encourage, promote, or enable” such behaviors. According to the blog post, teens may only communicate with specific AI characters that are associated with topics like sports and education.
Following other recent changes the firm made to help safeguard teenagers, Instagram has now implemented additional parental controls. This week, Facebook changed its “Teen Accounts” settings to conform to PG-13 classifications, which means that messages that include harsh language or that can encourage “harmful behaviors” won’t be displayed or promoted. OpenAI revealed ChatGPT’s parental restrictions in late September, which limit “graphic content, viral challenges, sexual, romantic or violent roleplay, and extreme beauty ideals.”
