Megan Garcia

AI started banning minors from interacting with its open-ended AI chatbots earlier this week.

That's after multiple lawsuits alleged that extensive conversations with these chatbots led several teenagers to die by suicide.

And comes a month after California passed the nation's first AI chatbot safeguards law, and a similar bill was introduced in the U.S.

Senate.

Megan Garcia lost her son, Sewell, last year and is one of the moms who sued the company.

She told U.S.

senators in September that she's supportive of more efforts to regulate AI chatbots.

Underage users will still have access to character AI.

The company introduced a feature for minors to create and explore fiction.

For NPR News, I'm Annika Salme in San Francisco.