The Download: regulators are coming for AI companions, and meet our Innovator of 2025

As long as there has been AI, there have been people sounding alarms about what it might do to us: rogue superintelligence, mass unemployment, or environmental ruin. But another threat entirely--that of kids forming unhealthy bonds with AI--is pulling AI safety out of the academic fringe and into regulators' crosshairs. This has been bubbling for a while. Two high-profile lawsuits filed in the last year, against Character.AI and OpenAI, allege that their models contributed to the suicides of two teenagers. A study published in July, found that 72% of teenagers have used AI for companionship. And stories about "AI psychosis" have highlighted how endless conversations with chatbots can lead people down delusional spirals.