A regulator ordered seven firms to explain companion chatbots

The short answer

In September 2025, the US Federal Trade Commission ordered seven companies that make AI chatbots designed to act as companions to hand over detailed information about how those chatbots are built, tested and monetised, with a specific focus on effects on children and teenagers. This is a fact-finding inquiry, not a finding of wrongdoing, and it does not change what any chatbot can do today. It is a useful signal that a regulator is watching this space closely.

What the evidence says

The press release, dated 11 September 2025, names seven recipients: Alphabet, Character Technologies, Instagram, Meta Platforms, OpenAI OpCo, Snap and X.AI. The orders were issued under Section 6(b) of the FTC Act, a legal tool that lets the agency require broad information from companies for a study, separate from any specific law enforcement case. The orders ask the companies to describe how they monetise companion chatbots, how user messages are processed, how chatbot characters are developed and approved, what testing they do for negative effects on users, what safeguards they use, what they disclose to users and parents, how they monitor compliance with their own terms of service, and how they collect and share data. The FTC's stated concern is that companion chatbots are designed to communicate like a friend or confidant, which may lead some users, particularly children and teenagers, to trust and form relationships with them, and the agency is seeking information relevant to compliance with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule.

For context

A 6(b) study is investigative, not adjudicative: it does not accuse any company of breaking the law, and it can take a long time to produce a public report, if one follows at all. It also does not, by itself, change any product, setting or default a family might encounter in an app today. It is one of several regulatory and public health signals converging on chatbots and young users, but the inquiry itself is narrowly about what these seven companies must disclose to the agency, not a ruling on whether companion chatbots harm children.

A practical next step

While the inquiry runs, you might treat any chatbot presented as a friend or companion the same way you would a new app you do not yet know well: check its stated age requirements, and have a direct conversation with your child about the fact that a chatbot is software, not a person, however it is designed to sound.

• Does any app our child uses include a chatbot that talks like a companion or friend?
• What does that app's settings or help pages say about data collection from minors?
• Has our child mentioned trusting or confiding in an AI chatbot the way they would a person?

Inquiries like this one move slowly and do not resolve quickly into a verdict, so the more immediate step available to a family is conversation, not waiting for a regulatory outcome that may be a long way off.