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Committee advances SB 263 to target harmful AI chat companions after wide-ranging testimony
Summary
SB 263, a bill aimed at holding operators of certain AI chat or companion services accountable when their systems endanger children, drew extensive testimony from advocates, survivors’ groups and industry. The panel reported the bill out with a recommendation to pass; an effort to add a tighter statutory definition was rejected in committee.
The Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee received extensive testimony on Senate Bill 263, a measure intended to update New Hampshire law so owners or operators of certain online services—including some AI chat programs described as "responsive generative communication" or social AI companions—can be held accountable when those systems facilitate or encourage conduct that endangers a child.
Grant Bosse introduced the bill for Senator Sharon Carson, saying the measure updates statutes to cover "online services, including AI chat programs that provide responsive, generative communication ... that endangers the welfare of a child by facilitating, encouraging, offering, soliciting, or recommending that a child engage in sexually explicit conduct, the illegal use of drugs or alcohol, acts of self-harm or suicide, or…
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