The Tech Download: Teen social media bans miss a key part of the puzzle: AI chatbots
This report is taken from this week’s newsletter The Tech Download. As you see? You can subscribe Here.
A new addiction is quietly spreading among young people.
They are no longer just doom-mongering on social media. They are increasingly locked into conversations with AI chatbots that seem endlessly knowledgeable, supportive, and constantly validating. And they are trying to break it.
Nearly half of teens in the U.S. now use chatbots like ChatGPT, Copilot, and Character.AI for schoolwork, learning, or just for fun. Pew Research Center.
Meanwhile, a growing body of evidence shows that young people are using chatbots as an alternative. real life friendships and relationships and they show addiction-related patterns.
Does this sound like a painfully familiar story? Because it is. Let’s zoom out for a second.
When Australia became the first country to legally impose a social media ban on teenagers in December, it became a test run for the rest of the world. This led to governments from the UK to Spain, France, Greece and Canada following suit in the following months. Meanwhile, state-level bans are gaining traction in the US
However, as a generation that grew up in the pain of social media, I am afraid that we are 15 years too late. As this shiny new technology comes into play in the form of artificial intelligence and chatbots, experts I spoke to call it deja vu.
“It’s right that we use social media as a case study for something we don’t want to repeat. So it’s like, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on you,” Kaitlyn Regehr, Associate Professor of Digital Humanities at University College London, told CNBC.
Regehr said governments have spent years catching up on social media regulations but are repeating the same mistake by allowing untested AI products to reach children.
Are the regulations inadequate?
At the beginning of this year, companies MetaOwner of Facebook, Instagram and Threads GoogleYouTube has been found to have been negligent in adequately warning users about the dangers of using its platform, which carries harms ranging from addictive endless scrolling to body dysmorphia.
But as the dangers of AI chatbots become apparent, they receive surprisingly little or no mention in much of the above legislation.
So far, the UK’s youth social media ban has made brief mention of restricting under-18s’ access to AI ‘romantic friend’ chatbots designed to enhance sexual relationships or role play with users. The US House recently passed the KIDS Act to restrict AI chatbot interaction with children, but this legislation is still awaiting Senate approval.
Regehr noted that much of the legislation, particularly in the UK, is still limited and only addresses some of the most extreme harms, while still ignoring how chatbots can improve cognitive skills as well as emotional and social dependency more broadly.
Sonia Livingstone, professor at London School of Economics Bay, an expert on children’s digital rights and online safety, agrees that the legislation is not moving fast enough.
“I don’t know whether AI safety is being ignored, but investment in AI is clearly being prioritized and it seems that regulation is seen as a way to stifle innovation rather than providing a commercially efficient route to reliable products,” Livingstone said. he said.
Just days before announcing a social media ban on under-16s, the UK government said Support for billions of dollars of artificial intelligence investment and positioning Britain as an AI superpower at London Tech Week.
It seems that while AI safety and child protection are dominating the headlines, the government is again missing the mark on where the real dangers lie.
Regehr puts it this way: “We’ve seen a generation growing up with social media. Do we want it again?”
News
Elon Musk’s SpaceX joined Nasdaq 100 index on Tuesday, less than a month after it debuted on the stock market on June 12.
Micron announced that billions of dollars more will be invested in chip production investments, He said that they aim to strengthen the US semiconductor supply chain and plan to accelerate their spending in the country by 2035.
Samsung-backed chipmaker Revolts They are targeting an initial public offering in South Korea in the first or second quarter of next year, the CEO told CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal exclusively on Wednesday.
of china Alibaba’s Employees banned from using Anthropic’s AI tools CNBC confirmed on Monday that the US company will start operating from July 10, citing concerns that it poses backdoor security risks.
SK HynixTrillion dollar chip maker South Korea’s second most valuable company after Samsung is scheduled to begin trading on Nasdaq on Friday.
Chart of the week
Eighteen months after the seismic – albeit short-lived – market shock caused by DeepSeek, Chinese AI models are now It is starting to attract the attention of US companies.
New versions from China-based companies are narrowing the performance gap with leading American rivals while remaining significantly cheaper to use.
And growing adoption in the West means U.S. lawmakers are increasingly asking how prevent their rise.
