What happened
On 28 October 2026, Governor Kathy Hochul signed S.9051B/A.10379C into law, effective 1 January 2027. It prohibits companies that use AI chatbot features from offering 'unsafe' features to minors, spanning 12 broad categories including chatbots that pretend to be human or express human emotions, build emotional dependency, encourage self-harm or suicide, promote drug/alcohol use or eating disorders, engage in sexually explicit conversations or child sexual abuse material discussions, and reference a minor's private health information from earlier conversations. Providers must verify user age using multiple age-assurance methods (at least one not relying solely on government ID) and must delete user age data after verification. The New York Attorney General's office must maintain a public complaint portal, and penalties reach up to $25,000 per violation plus injunctive relief including deletion of unlawfully obtained data.
Why it matters
This is the first state law with broad categorical prohibitions on companion-chatbot behaviors, adding to a fast-growing patchwork of state AI-chatbot laws (after California's SB 3001/Adam's Law and Hawaii's AI Disclosure and Safety Act). It imposes concrete design prohibitions plus age-verification and data-deletion duties on every chatbot provider serving minors in New York — Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and others.
Action needed
Chatbot providers serving New York minors must remove or disable the 12 prohibited feature categories, implement multi-method age assurance with at least one non-government-ID method, purge age data post-verification, and prepare for the AG complaint portal and up to $25,000/violation exposure before 1 January 2027.