California Signs Chatbot and Social Media Child Safety Law, Requiring Crisis Intervention and Independent Audits

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed multiple bipartisan bills to strengthen protections for children's online use of AI and social media. Among them, the "Adam's Law" named after Adam Raine requires companion chatbots to provide crisis intervention protocols for suicidal ideation, parental controls, and notification to parents when children turn off safety settings, while also requiring companies to conduct independent child safety audits and annual risk assessments. The new laws also prohibit social platforms from providing addictive features to users under 16, such as autoplay and algorithmic feeds based on user history and profiles, include AI-generated or digitally altered sexual content of minors in child sexual exploitation, and restrict targeted advertising to children and the use of K-12 student data in AI systems. The signed bills include AB 1709, SB 1119, AB 2, AB 1856, AB 1946, AB 2246, AB 1159, AB 2071, AB 302, SB 1276, SB 1128, AB 2298, SB 867, and others.