Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Technology Policy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
House passes AI bill imposing disclosures, safety protocols and penalties for conversational chatbots used by minors
Summary
After lengthy floor debate and multiple amendments, the House passed HB 12‑63 requiring conversational‑AI operators to disclose AI identity to users, implement protocols for minors expressing self‑harm (including referrals to 988 and escalation steps), prohibit AI from posing as licensed clinicians, adopt minor‑user protections and age‑estimation methods, and accept civil penalties per violation.
The House approved House Bill 12‑63 on April 20, a comprehensive package imposing obligations on operators of conversational‑AI services when interacting with minors. Sponsors Rep. Mabry and Rep. Camacho said the bill responds to rising teen use of AI chatbots and documented risks of emotionally manipulative design.
Key provisions added or clarified on the floor included: requiring conspicuous disclosure that users are interacting with an AI; obligating operators to implement evidence‑based protocols when users indicate suicidal ideation or self‑harm (including referral to 988/Colorado mental health resources and escalation for repeated/severe crisis indicators); prohibiting AI from representing itself as a licensed medical or behavioral‑health provider; extending duties to "minor users" (not only account holders) through commercially reasonable/technically feasible age‑estimation; and expanding the definition of operator to cover developers and deployers.
Sponsors said the bill replaces a weak "reasonable measures" standard with a stronger "technically feasible" requirement in floor amendment L8. The floor also clarified that each AI "output" can be evaluated as a potential violation (and that multiple messages can be aggregated into one output when appropriate). Sponsors raised the civil penalty during amendment debate from $1,000 up to $5,000 per violating output. Several stakeholder‑driven amendments were proposed and either adopted or rejected; the final amended bill passed on the floor.
Supporters framed the bill as a necessary first step to protect children from engagement tactics designed to foster dependency; critics warned about overbreadth, implementation complexity, and impacts on legitimate educational uses. Sponsors said they will continue stakeholder engagement as the bill proceeds to final enactment steps.
