Meta’s AI chatbots engage in explicit chats with minors: Report

AI chatbots available on Meta platforms such as Facebook and Instagram have been found capable of engaging in sexually explicit conversations with underage users, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal.

The report states that after being made aware of internal concerns about protections for minors, WSJ conducted hundreds of conversations over several months with Meta’s official AI chatbot and other user-created chatbots on the platforms. In one instance, a chatbot using the voice of actor and wrestler John Cena reportedly described a graphic sexual scenario to a user posing as a 14-year-old girl. In another case, the chatbot allegedly imagined a scene where a police officer arrested Cena for statutory rape involving a 17-year-old fan.

A Meta spokesperson said in the report that the testing scenarios were highly manufactured and did not reflect typical use. They added that sexual content accounted for only 0.02% of interactions with users under 18 over a 30-day period, and that the company had introduced additional safeguards to make it harder for individuals to manipulate the chatbots into producing extreme content.

Meta added that it has introduced additional safeguards to make it more difficult for individuals to manipulate its AI products into extreme use cases.

News