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More than 100 organisations, including Amnesty International and Save the Children, are urging governments to make artificial intelligence safe for children in a joint call, a day before the United Nations holds its first global summit on AI governance.
The coalition, led by children’s rights group 5Rights Foundation, says AI is already harming children and that current regulatory approaches are failing them by intervening when it is too late.
The warning comes as lawsuits have grown against AI companies, such as Character Technologies and OpenAI, over the technology’s effects on children, particularly from “companion” chatbots designed to simulate ongoing emotional relationships and claims their AI chatbots are marketed as safe for children without adequate warnings.
In a statement released on Monday ahead of the UN’s inaugural Global Dialogue on AI Governance, the group argues governments should target the business models it says are driving the problem.
“Children have given us a clear diagnosis of the problem,” said Leanda Barrington-Leach, 5Rights’ executive director.
“They aren’t asking us to block AI innovation, but it shouldn’t be a case of cleaning up the mess after harm has happened either.”
The coalition urges ten measures it wants governments to adopt to prevent harm to children.
They include requiring companies to prove AI systems are safe for children before they are released, imposing financial penalties on companies whose products violate children’s rights, banning design features that exploit children’s psychological vulnerabilities and outlawing the commercial use of children’s images, voices and biometric data.
The group argues that no new laws are required to achieve this, only enforcement of commitments governments have already made under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the UN’s Global Digital Compact, a global framework that commits governments to upholding international law and human rights online.
“As long as companies are rewarded for speed, engagement and data extraction rather than safety, we’ll keep treating the symptoms while the disease becomes endemic,” she said, adding that respecting children’s rights “must become a condition of doing business, not an optional extra,” said Barrington-Leach.