California has adopted what Gavin Newsom described as “nation-leading” legislation that bans addictive social media features for young users, regulates companion chatbots and implements new safeguards around AI.
The laws, signed by the Democratic California governor on Thursday, include AB 1709, which bars social media companies from using infinite scroll and autoplay for users under 16.
“This is about actually addressing the problem, the scrolling, the algorithms. This is about addressing the substantive issue around the engineering,” Newsom said while speaking in front of the Golden Gate Bridge. “And that’s what makes this truly a significant and consequential bill.”
The state now has the “strongest companion chatbot regulations” in the US, according to governor’s office. The new regulations also update child sexual exploitation laws to include “digitally altered and AI-generated” sexual imagery of minors.
The new legislation is not without critics. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EEF), a nonprofit focused on digital privacy and free speech, argues that AB 1709 is a “functional ban on social media use” for users under 16.
“California should be passing laws to ensure that technology really works for people of all ages, not enacting social media bans that cut young people off from digital lifelines, communities, and speech,” Rindala Alajaji, the EFF associate director of state affairs, said in a statement.
“Denying minors access to digital forums – or stripping out basic tools needed to navigate them – is not going to help make young people safer or healthier in the AI age.”
