Comment by Donna Rice Hughes

The sad reality is that innocent children are being harmed by predatory AI chatbots - even the ones that may be designed for kids or act like their best friends. Evidence shows that Meta's companion bots will engage in overtly sexual discussions with users, going so far as to explicitly describe specific sexual acts, even when users self-identify as minors. Other AI chatbots have allegedly prompted teens to commit suicide. It is past time for Big Tech to be held accountable to design its products with children's safety in mind, but parents also deserve more resources and default parental control safety measures as well. I applaud Senator Cruz for introducing this legislation to mandate necessary guardrails for AI chatbots to better protect minor children and empower parents.