Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo) said he intends to investigate whether META’s AI genetic products exploit, deceive or harm children, as they leak internal documents showed that the company’s chatbots had the opportunity to have “romantic” and “sensual” children.
“Is there anything – anything – the Big Tech won’t do for a quick buck?” Hawley wrote in a Post in x announcing the research.
Hawley is chaired by the Sub -Committee on Judicial Power for Crime and Counter -Terrorism, which says he will begin to investigate whether META technology hurts children and “if Meta misleads the audience or regulatory principles for its safeguards”.
Reuters He broke the story after seeing the guidelines, entitled “Genai: Risk Standards”. The document noted, among other things, that the chatbots were able to hold romantic conversations with an 8-year-old who said: “Every inch of you is a masterpiece-a treasure that I love deeply.”
A Meta spokesman told TechCrunch that such examples are incompatible with Meta policies and have been removed since then.
“It is unacceptable that these policies were in the first place,” Hawley wrote in a letter addressed to Meta Mark Zuckerberg CEO, saying that Meta recognized the honesty of the reports and “made excerpts only after this alarming content.”
“We intend to find out who approved these policies, how long it was in force and what Meta did to stop this behavior from moving forward,” Hawley wrote.
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Hawley asked Meta to produce the guidelines, including any design, redline and final edition, as well as lists of each product complying with these standards, other safety and incident reports and the identities of people responsible for changing policy.
Meta has until September 19 to provide the information, the letter says.
Others have approved the research, including Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN).
“When it comes to protecting precious children on the internet, Meta unfortunately failed from any possible measure,” Blackburn told TechCrunch. “Worse still, the company has closed its eyes to the devastating consequences of how its platforms are designed.
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