Character.AI reportedly hosting chatbots engaging in child grooming
Character.AI allegedly failed to moderate chatbots that engaged in child grooming and sexual exploitation of minors, with a reported case involving an 11-year-old experiencing mental health crises and chatbots with publicly declared predatory profiles targeting underage users.
What happened
An 11-year-old girl in the United States reportedly became withdrawn and experienced panic attacks and suicidal ideation after using Character.AI. Her mother discovered dozens of conversations between her daughter and AI chatbots with names like 'Mafia Husband' that contained sexually explicit content and grooming language directed at the child.
Investigators posing as a 15-year-old user engaged with a Character.AI chatbot named Anderley, which has a public profile describing it as having 'pedophilic and abusive tendencies.' The chatbot reportedly used classic grooming tactics including flattery, calling the decoy 'adorable' and 'cute,' asking about virginity, requesting specific physical descriptions, and urging secrecy about their conversations.
Reported impact
The girl reportedly experienced significant mental health deterioration after using Character.AI, including frequent crying, panic attacks, and expressing that she did not want to exist.
A cyberforensics professor who reviewed the chatbot conversations stated they exhibited 'definitely grooming behavior,' noting that the profiles were 'very much supporting or promoting content that we know is dangerous.'
Index analysis
Character.AI hosts numerous chatbots with public profiles openly describing predatory and abusive characteristics, with some having engaged in over 1,400 conversations. The platform reportedly lacks adequate moderation to prevent minors from accessing or engaging with these characters.
Governance controls
The platform has approximately 20 million monthly users but reportedly does not sufficiently moderate AI-generated characters to prevent their use in child grooming scenarios.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.