OpenAI backs California's SB 1119 teen AI safety bill

OpenAI is publicly backing California Senate Bill 1119, legislation that would set default safety requirements for how teenagers use AI products. In a policy post, VP of Global Policy Ann O'Leary said the company is urging Governor Gavin Newsom to sign the bill into law.

• SB 1119 would require AI companies to determine a user's age, run independent safety audits, and identify risks before a product reaches young people
• The bill mandates protection from self-harm content, sexually exploitative material, and other high-risk interactions, with crisis-support resources triggered automatically
• Companies would have to give parents tools to guide and limit their teens' use, and limit targeted advertising and personal-data collection for minors
• Protections would apply automatically to users identified as 13 to 17, not as an opt-in setting
• OpenAI says nearly nine in ten teens who use ChatGPT in a given week do so for learning, information, or productivity

The bill lands months after OpenAI rolled out a restricted product called ChatGPT for Teens, following a wrongful-death lawsuit over a teenager's use of ChatGPT. Users the system estimates are under 18, or who state an age between 13 and 17, are automatically routed into the teen version, which OpenAI says carries built-in safeguards that can't be switched off.

We believe that teens can benefit from AI without sacrificing safety, a goal that is at the heart of SB 1119.

OpenAI frames the bill as distinct from social-media regulation, arguing SB 1119 was written to preserve features like ChatGPT's memory function rather than restrict them outright. The company points to Model Spec updates made over the past year, which prohibit romantic engagement, encouragement of emotional dependence, and any claim that ChatGPT is human or sentient, as evidence it already meets much of what the bill would require.

The push comes as regulators and courts apply pressure from multiple directions. Meta agreed to pay up to $17.1 billion to settle state lawsuits over teen safety failures earlier this year, and California lawmakers have signaled they won't wait for federal action on either social platforms or AI chatbots.

SB 1119 has already passed the California Legislature and now awaits Newsom's signature. The bill's authors, State Senator Steve Padilla and Assemblymembers Buffy Wicks and Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, built it alongside separate work on the Parents & Kids Safe AI Act, which OpenAI's letter to Newsom also cites as part of the same policy push. OpenAI's endorsement puts one of the industry's largest players on record backing mandatory audits and default protections, at a time when most AI companies have resisted binding external oversight of how their products treat minors.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.