Meta Pauses Teen One‑on‑One AI Chats

Meta is “temporarily pausing” the ability for teens to have one‑on‑one chats with its AI characters while it builds a “new iteration” of those characters intended to deliver a “better experience.” The company announced the change in an update to an October blog post about planned parental controls; the block on teen access will begin “starting in the coming weeks.”

A Meta spokesperson, Sophie Vogel, told The Verge the pause is pragmatic: because the company is redeveloping AI characters for both adults and teens, it doesn’t want to build parental controls twice. Vogel said teen access to the current characters will be paused so Meta can focus on the new version, and that when the iteration for teens is ready it will include parental controls.

TechCrunch reported Meta heard from parents asking for more visibility and control over teens’ AI interactions. In October Meta outlined controls it planned to offer: blocking teens’ one‑on‑one conversations, blocking specific AI characters, and sharing insight summaries with parents about topics teens discuss. Meta says it’s still working out how to share conversation insights from its AI assistant and that feature is “coming soon.” The Verge article also notes Meta’s wider teen‑safety changes last October around Instagram teen accounts.