ByteDance and Alibaba are shutting down the features that let users build and chat with custom AI companions, responding to new regulations from Beijing. According to the South China Morning Post, Doubao, China's most popular chatbot with over 300 million monthly users, will take its persona feature offline on July 15. Alibaba's Qwen is pulling its human-like agents even sooner, on July 10, with "additional agent features" going dark on July 15. Tencent's Yuanbao already made the same move in June.
The rules behind these changes were issued by China's Cyberspace Administration in April and take effect the same day. Providers must warn against excessive use and step in when they detect addictive behavior. Content that triggers extreme emotions in minors or fosters dependencies that crowd out real-world relationships is banned. So is training on sensitive conversation data.
The trend isn't limited to China. California has required companion AI providers to block conversations about suicide and self-harm since the start of the year under SB 243. In the US, OpenAI and Character.AI face lawsuits over dangerous emotional dependency.
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