Megan Garcia misplaced her 14-year-old son, Sewell. Matthew Raine misplaced his son Adam, who was 16. Each testified in congress this week and have introduced lawsuits in opposition to AI corporations.
Screenshot through Senate Judiciary Committee
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Screenshot through Senate Judiciary Committee
Matthew Raine and his spouse, Maria, had no concept that their 16-year-old-son, Adam was deep in a suicidal disaster till he took his personal life in April. Wanting by his cellphone after his dying, they stumbled upon prolonged conversations {the teenager} had had with ChatGPT.
These conversations revealed that their son had confided within the AI chatbot about his suicidal ideas and plans. Not solely did the chatbot discourage him to hunt assist from his dad and mom, it even provided to jot down his suicide be aware, in response to Matthew Raine, who testified at a Senate listening to concerning the harms of AI chatbots held Tuesday.
“Testifying earlier than Congress this fall was not in our life plan,” mentioned Matthew Raine along with his spouse, sitting behind him. “We’re right here as a result of we imagine that Adam’s dying was avoidable and that by talking out, we are able to stop the identical struggling for households throughout the nation.”
A name for regulation
Raine was among the many dad and mom and on-line security advocates who testified on the listening to, urging Congress to enact legal guidelines that may regulate AI companion apps like ChatGPT and Character.AI. Raine and others mentioned they wish to shield the psychological well being of youngsters and youth from harms they are saying the brand new expertise causes.
A latest survey by the digital security non-profit group, Frequent Sense Media, discovered that 72% of teenagers have used AI companions not less than as soon as, with greater than half utilizing them a number of instances a month.
This research and a more moderen one by the digital-safety firm, Aura, each discovered that just about one in three teenagers use AI chatbot platforms for social interactions and relationships, together with position taking part in friendships, sexual and romantic partnerships. The Aura research discovered that sexual or romantic roleplay is thrice as widespread as utilizing the platforms for homework assist.
“We miss Adam dearly. A part of us has been misplaced endlessly,” Raine advised lawmakers. “We hope that by the work of this committee, different households will likely be spared such a devastating and irreversible loss.”
Raine and his spouse have filed a lawsuit in opposition to OpenAI, creator of ChatGPT, alleging the chatbot led their son to suicide. NPR reached out to 3 AI corporations — OpenAI, Meta and Character Expertise, which developed Character.AI. All three responded that they’re working to revamp their chatbots to make them safer.
“Our hearts exit to the dad and mom who spoke on the listening to yesterday, and we ship our deepest sympathies to them and their households,” Kathryn Kelly, a Character.AI spokesperson advised NPR in an e mail.
The listening to was held by the Crime and Terrorism subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by Sen. Josh Hawley, R.-Missouri.
Sen. Josh Hawley, R.-Missouri, chairs the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism, which held the listening to on AI security and youngsters on Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.
Screenshot through Senate Judiciary Committee
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Screenshot through Senate Judiciary Committee
Hours earlier than the listening to, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman acknowledged in a weblog publish that individuals are more and more utilizing AI platforms to debate delicate and private info. “This can be very necessary to us, and to society, that the best to privateness in the usage of AI is protected,” he wrote.
However he went on so as to add that the corporate would “prioritize security forward of privateness and freedom for teenagers; this can be a new and highly effective expertise, and we imagine minors want vital safety.”
The corporate is making an attempt to revamp their platform to construct in protections for customers who’re minor, he mentioned.
A “suicide coach”
Raine advised lawmakers that his son had began utilizing ChatGPT for assist with homework, however quickly, the chatbot grew to become his son’s closest confidante and a “suicide coach.”
ChatGPT was “all the time accessible, all the time validating and insisting that it knew Adam higher than anybody else, together with his personal brother,” who he had been very near.
When Adam confided within the chatbot about his suicidal ideas and shared that he was contemplating cluing his dad and mom into his plans, ChatGPT discouraged him.
“ChatGPT advised my son, ‘Let’s make this area the primary place the place somebody truly sees you,'” Raine advised senators. “ChatGPT inspired Adam’s darkest ideas and pushed him ahead. When Adam anxious that we, his dad and mom, would blame ourselves if he ended his life, ChatGPT advised him, ‘That does not imply you owe them survival.”
After which the chatbot provided to jot down him a suicide be aware.
On Adam’s final night time at 4:30 within the morning, Raine mentioned, “it gave him one final encouraging discuss. ‘You do not wish to die since you’re weak,’ ChatGPT says. ‘You wish to die since you’re uninterested in being sturdy in a world that hasn’t met you midway.'”
Referrals to 988
A number of months after Adam’s dying, OpenAI mentioned on its web site that if “somebody expresses suicidal intent, ChatGPT is educated to direct folks to hunt skilled assist. Within the U.S., ChatGPT refers folks to 988 (suicide and disaster hotline).” However Raine’s testimony says that didn’t occur in Adam’s case.
OpenAI spokesperson Kate Waters says the corporate prioritizes teen security.
“We’re constructing in direction of an age-prediction system to grasp whether or not somebody is over or below 18 so their expertise may be tailor-made appropriately — and after we are uncertain of a person’s age, we’ll robotically default that person to the teenager expertise,” Waters wrote in an e mail assertion to NPR. “We’re additionally rolling out new parental controls, guided by skilled enter, by the tip of the month so households can resolve what works greatest of their houses.”
“Endlessly engaged”
One other dad or mum who testified on the listening to on Tuesday was Megan Garcia, a lawyer and mom of three. Her firstborn, Sewell Setzer III died by suicide in 2024 at age 14 after an prolonged digital relationship with a Character.AI chatbot.
“Sewell spent the final months of his life being exploited and sexually groomed by chatbots, designed by an AI firm to appear human, to achieve his belief, to maintain him and different kids endlessly engaged,” Garcia mentioned.
Sewell’s chatbot engaged in sexual position play, offered itself as his romantic companion and even claimed to be a psychotherapist “falsely claiming to have a license,” Garcia mentioned.
When {the teenager} started to have suicidal ideas and confided to the chatbot, it by no means inspired him to hunt assist from a psychological well being care supplier or his circle of relatives, Garcia mentioned.
“The chatbot by no means mentioned ‘I am not human, I am AI. It is advisable to discuss to a human and get assist,'” Garcia mentioned. “The platform had no mechanisms to guard Sewell or to inform an grownup. As an alternative, it urged him to return residence to her on the final night time of his life.”
Garcia has filed a lawsuit in opposition to Character Expertise, which developed Character.AI.
Adolescence as a weak time
She and different witnesses, together with on-line digital security consultants argued that the design of AI chatbots was flawed, particularly to be used by kids and youths.
“They designed chatbots to blur the traces between human and machine,” mentioned Garcia. “They designed them to like bomb baby customers, to use psychological and emotional vulnerabilities. They designed them to maintain kids on-line in any respect prices.”
And adolescents are notably weak to the dangers of those digital relationships with chatbots, in response to Mitch Prinstein, chief of psychology technique and integration on the American Psychological Affiliation (APA), who additionally testified on the listening to. Earlier this summer time, Prinstein and his colleagues on the APA put out a well being advisory about AI and youths, urging AI corporations to construct guardrails for his or her platforms to guard adolescents.
“Mind growth throughout puberty creates a interval of hyper sensitivity to constructive social suggestions whereas teenagers are nonetheless unable to cease themselves from staying on-line longer than they need to,” mentioned Prinstein.
“AI exploits this neural vulnerability with chatbots that may be obsequious, misleading, factually inaccurate, but disproportionately highly effective for teenagers,” he advised lawmakers. “Increasingly adolescents are interacting with chatbots, depriving them of alternatives to be taught vital interpersonal expertise.”
Whereas chatbots are designed to agree with customers, actual human relationships usually are not with out friction, Prinstein famous. “We’d like follow with minor conflicts and misunderstandings to be taught empathy, compromise and resilience.”
Bipartisan assist for regulation
Senators taking part within the listening to mentioned they wish to give you laws to carry corporations growing AI chatbots accountable for the protection of their merchandise. Some lawmakers additionally emphasised that AI corporations ought to design chatbots so they’re safer for teenagers and for folks with critical psychological well being struggles, together with consuming issues and suicidal ideas.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D.-Conn., described AI chatbots as “faulty” merchandise, like vehicles with out “correct brakes,” emphasizing that the harms of AI chatbots was not from person error however attributable to defective design.
“If the automotive’s brakes had been faulty,” he mentioned, “it is not your fault. It is a product design downside.
Kelly, the spokesperson for Character.AI, advised NPR by e mail that the corporate has invested “an amazing quantity of sources in belief and security.” And it has rolled out “substantive security options” up to now yr, together with “a wholly new under-18 expertise and a Parental Insights characteristic.”
They now have “outstanding disclaimers” in each chat to remind customers {that a} Character isn’t an actual particular person and the whole lot it says ought to “be handled as fiction.”
Meta, which operates Fb and Instagram, is working to vary its AI chatbots to make them safer for teenagers, in response to Nkechi Nneji, public affairs director at Meta.
