Things to Do in L.A. Tap to enable a layout that focuses on the article. A teenager demonstrates Character.AI, an artificial intelligence chatbot platform that allows users to chat with popular characters. This is read by an automated voice. Please report any issues or inconsistencies here . Gov. Gavin Newsom has until mid-October to decide whether to sign AI chatbot safety bills into law but faces opposition from tech companies.

Days after Vice President Kamala Harris launched her presidential bid, a video -- created with the help of artificial intelligence -- went viral. "I ... am your Democrat candidate for president because Joe Biden finally exposed his senility at the debate," a voice that sounded like Harris' said in the fake audio track used to alter one of her campaign ads. "I was selected because I am the ultimate diversity hire." Billionaire Elon Musk -- who has endorsed Harris' Republican opponent, former President Trump-- shared the video on X, then clarified two days later that it was actually meant as a parody. His initial tweet had 136 million views.

For four years, Jacob Hilton worked for one of the most influential startups in the Bay Area -- OpenAI. His research helped test and improve the truthfulness of AI models such as ChatGPT. He believes artificial intelligence can benefit society, but he also recognizes the serious risks if the technology is left unchecked. Hilton was among 13 current and former OpenAI and Google employees who this month signed an open letter that called for more whistleblower protections, citing broad confidentiality agreements as problematic. "The basic situation is that employees, the people closest to the technology, they're also the ones with the most to lose from being retaliated against for speaking up," says Hilton, 33, now a researcher at the nonprofit Alignment Research Center, who lives in Berkeley.

At a Fresno County elementary school, a masked man with a fake gun carried out an active-shooter drill without most of the teachers and parents being informed ahead of time. At San Marino High School, police officers planned to fire blanks to mimic the sound of gunfire, but the drill was ultimately canceled over concerns of traumatizing students. More recently, a principal at a San Gabriel elementary school was placed on a leave of absence after allegedly using her fingers to mime holding a gun and pretending to shoot kids, telling them, "Boom. The rise in active-shooter drills at American schools has coincided with the growing phenomenon of mass shootings in the U.S., as well as media coverage focused on school massacres including Columbine, Sandy Hook and Uvalde. These drills have taken place at 95% of U.S. public schools as of the 2015-16 school year, according to the Education Department's National Center for Education statistics.

The Los Angeles Police Department has used facial-recognition software nearly 30,000 times since 2009, with hundreds of officers running images of suspects from surveillance cameras and other sources against a massive database of mugshots taken by law enforcement. The new figures, released to The Times, reveal for the first time how commonly facial recognition is used in the department, which for years has provided vague and contradictory information about how and whether it uses the technology. The LAPD has consistently denied having records related to facial recognition, and at times denied using the technology at all. The truth is that, while it does not have its own facial-recognition platform, LAPD personnel have access to facial-recognition software through a regional database maintained by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. And between Nov. 6, 2009, and Sept. 11 of this year, LAPD officers used the system's software 29,817 times.

Nearly a decade ago, Santa Cruz was among the first cities in the U.S. to adopt predictive policing. This week, the California city became the first in the country to ban the policy. In a unanimous decision Tuesday, the City Council passed an ordinance that banishes the use of data to predict where crimes may occur and also barred the city from using facial recognition software. In recent years, both predictive policing and facial recognition technology have been criticized as racially prejudiced, often contributing to increased patrols in Black or brown neighborhoods or false accusations against people of color. Predictive policing uses algorithms that encourage officers to patrol locations identified as high-crime based on victim reports.

California lawmakers have passed a bill that bans law enforcement from using facial recognition technology gathered by body cameras – in a bid to end privacy abuse. The bill, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom, will go into effect in 2020 and last for three years. The motion also prohibits cops from using biometric surveillance including other forms of identification that can be capture from body camera videos. California lawmakers have passed a bill that bans law enforcement from using facial recognition technology gathered by body cameras – in a bid to end privacy abuse. The bill is first of its kind in the US and recognizes that'the use of facial recognition and other biometric surveillance is the functional equivalent of requiring every person to show a personal photo identification card at all times in violation of recognized constitutional rights.

The use of bots to meddle in political elections. Algorithms that learn who people are and keep them coming back to social media platforms. The rise of autonomous vehicles and drones that could displace hundreds of thousands of workers. The "robot apocalypse" that some envisioned with the rise of artificial intelligence hasn't arrived, but machine learning systems are becoming part of Californians' everyday lives, tech experts told state lawmakers in Sacramento earlier this month. As use of the technology becomes more widespread, so will the challenges for legislators who will have to grapple with how and when they should step in to protect people's personal data.

But without better transparency laws, the public will have little knowledge of what these automated systems are collecting from everyday people and whether their predictions are accurate, said Matt Cagle, a technology lawyer with the ACLU of Northern California.

A California lawmaker doesn't want operators of self-driving vehicles sneaking their cars on the road without permission. Democratic Assemblyman Phil Ting of San Francisco Thursday proposed fines as high as $25,000 per vehicle per day for any company testing self-driving vehicles on public roads without first obtaining a two-year, $150 permit from the Department of Motor Vehicles. "I applaud our innovation economy and all the companies developing autonomous vehicle technology, but no community should face what we did in San Francisco," Ting said in a press release. "The pursuit of innovation does not include a license to put innocent lives at risk." The measure is a response to Uber's decision in December to put 16 autonomous Volvos on the street in San Francisco without a permit.