Protecting Families in the AI Era: how generative AI harms kids and why policy must keep up
Generative AI is transforming how children learn, connect, and explore, but without strong safeguards, it’s exposing them to significant risks.
How do we know? Recent reports, Fake Friend and The Illusion of Safety from the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) reveal that AI companies are failing to protect kids, despite their promises of safety.
And that’s not all A groundbreaking report, Darling, Please Come Back Soon from ParentsTogether Action and Heat Initiative exposes how AI chatbots can expose children to explicit and harmful interactions.
CCDH CEO Imran Ahmed, ParentsTogether Action’s Director of Tech Accountability Campaigns Shelby Knox came together to discuss the harms of AI chatbots to children with special guest Senate Judiciary Ranking Member Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL). The event was moderated by Heat Initiative’s CEO, Sarah Gardner.
“[AI] tools are built to be engaging, persuasive and omnipresent, not to be cautious, careful or protective, especially when it really matters. And worse still, they’re using our children as their test subjects,” Imran explained.
“Tech companies can release dangerous, untested AI products directly to our kids with virtually no consequences. They can wait until children are harmed or even killed, and only then make voluntary changes,” Shelby pointed out.
“You wonder if [harms caused by AI chatbots] could have happened to your family, and I think all of us with children and grandchildren realize the answer is yes. And the problem, of course, is that these folks that are peddling this terrible opportunity to young people seem not to care,” Senator Durbin said. His proposed legislation, the AI LEAD Act, will establish a product liability framework that will provide for both regulation and a pathway to litigation for victims and families.
Watch our webinar to learn more about the harms of AI and how the AI LEAD Act can help mitigate these issues: