EdLaw
New York S.9051-B / A.10379-C — unsafe AI companion features for minors (2025–26)
A bill, not law. S.9051-B (Gonzalez; same as A.10379-C, Bores) would add Article 48 to the General Business Law, "Prohibition on unsafe AI companion features for minors" (§§1800–1805). It passed the Senate on 4 June 2026 and the Assembly on 5 June 2026; the Assembly bill page's actions end at "returned to senate" (06/05/2026), with no delivery to the Governor recorded when this was retrieved on 2026-10-13 (history). If it becomes law, § 3 reads "This act shall take effect January 1, 2027." Re-check its status on every sweep (METHODOLOGY section 6).
Applicability to EdTech
The bill reaches far beyond the AI companions of Article 47. A "Covered AI companion" "shall mean a generative artificial intelligence system with a natural language interface, including via writing or sound, that provides ongoing, adaptive responses to user inputs" (§1800(5)) — a definition with no relationship or memory test, which a conversational tutor, a voice assistant or a chat-based learning tool meets on its face.
The prohibition is on providing "unsafe AI companion features" to a covered user unless the user is not a covered minor and the operator has used permitted age-determination methods (§1801(1)). A covered minor is a covered user "when the operator has actual knowledge that the covered user is a minor" (§1800(9)). The unsafe features include outputs "stating or implying that the covered AI companion has a personal relationship, professional relationship, or an authority figure role with the user" (§1800(8)(b)), outputs "framed as the covered AI companion's personal opinions or emotional appeals" ((c)), outputs "that engage in flattery or sycophancy with the user" ((d)), and the use of information about the user's well-being or personal matters "acquired from the user more than twelve hours previously or in any previous user session" ((f)).
There is no exclusion for education or for products provided through schools. The exclusions are for customer service, for "providing efficiency improvements or research or technical assistance, provided that the covered AI companion is unable to respond on topics outside of the specified purpose", and for a business's internal purposes (§1801(2), (b)).
Key obligations at a glance
- Unsafe AI companion features defined in twelve paragraphs, from simulated humanity and authority roles to self-harm, secrecy, engagement optimisation and sexual content — §1800(8).
- Prohibition on providing them to a covered user unless age-determined not to be a covered minor — §1801(1); exclusions — §1801(2).
- Age assurance pending regulations: reasonable methods, self-declaration only of minor status, more than one method including an anonymous or non-ID option, immediate deletion of age data — §1804.
- Applies to conduct in whole or in part in New York — §1805.
Enforcement
The Attorney General may sue for injunctions, restitution, disgorgement "including but not limited to the destruction of unlawfully obtained data and any algorithm trained in such data", damages and civil penalties of up to $25,000 per violation; contractual waivers are void — §1802, (3). The Attorney General may make rules — §1803.
Contents
| Document | Covers |
|---|---|
| S9051-B.md | Legislative history to 2026-10-13 and the bill text: proposed §§1800–1805, severability (§ 2) and effective date (§ 3) |
Licence
The fact document reproduces a bill printed by the New York Legislature and served by the Assembly. No copyright subsists in it. In Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc., 590 U.S. 255 (2020) (slip opinion, pp. 1 and 5–6, read 2026-10-01), the Supreme Court held that "judges—and, we now confirm, legislators—may not be considered the 'authors' of the works they produce in the course of their official duties as judges and legislators. That rule applies regardless of whether a given material carries the force of law." A bill is such a work. The Assembly bill pages (read 2026-10-13) carry no copyright notice.
Conditions: none attach. The corpus names the official source in Sources and in the document's {.meta} provenance lines, and Meta describes what it changed (line numbers dropped, lines rejoined, anchors added, nothing reworded).
Related
- N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law Art. 47 — the AI companion statute in force; §1800(4) borrows its definition
- Adam's Law (SB 1119) — California's enacted counterpart for children
- NY A.9190 / S.10133 — the companion proposal on AI in classrooms before ninth grade