AI chatbots to face strict online safety rules in UK

London
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AI chatbot providers, including ChatGPT and Grok, are facing a crackdown on illegal content in the United Kingdom, as the government promises swift action to make the internet safer for children.

“Today we are closing loopholes that put children at risk, and laying the groundwork for further action,” UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in a statement Monday.

Britain’s clampdown comes as artificial intelligence and social media have come under renewed fire for potential harms to young people after the Grok chatbot generated sexualized images of women and children for weeks on X, prompting a major global backlash.

Central to the UK government’s plan is an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, which will require AI chatbot providers to comply with duties under the Online Safety Act to protect users from illegal content. Failure to do so could result in fines and other penalties.

The government will also seek new legal powers designed to fast-track future protections for children’s wellbeing online.

This will enable it to act quickly on measures such as setting a minimum age of 16 for social media use — a proposal that opened for public consultation last month and follows similar developments in Australia and Spain.

Other possible measures include curbing features such as infinite scrolling, tightening safeguards around the sharing of nude images, and examining restrictions on children’s access to AI chatbots and virtual private networks.

The move highlights a push by legislators globally to ensure that domestic laws keep pace with the breakneck speed of advances in artificial intelligence. The UK’s Online Safety Act, while an ambitious effort to regulate digital platforms, was passed in 2023, when AI chatbots…

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