A 222: Imposes liability for misleading, incorrect, contradictory or harmful information to a user by a chatbot that results in financial loss or other demonstrable harm.

  
  STATE OF NEW YORK ________________________________________________________________________ 222 2025-2026 Regular Sessions  IN ASSEMBLY (Prefiled) January 8, 2025 ___________ Introduced by M. of A. VANEL -- read once and referred to the Committee on Consumer Affairs and Protection AN ACT to amend the general business law, in relation to liability for false information provided by a chatbot The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem- bly, do enact as follows: 1 Section 1. The general business law is amended by adding a new section 2 390-f to read as follows: 3 § 390-f. Liability for chatbot responses. 1. As used in this section 4 the following terms shall have the following meanings: 5 (a) "Chatbot" shall mean an artificial intelligence system, software 6 program, or technological application that simulates human-like conver- 7 sation and interaction through text messages, voice commands, or a 8 combination thereof to provide information and services to users. 9 (b) "Proprietor" refers to any person, business, company, organiza- 10 tion, institution or government entity operating with more than twenty 11 employees that owns, operates or deploys a chatbot system used to inter- 12 act with users. Proprietors shall not include third-party developers 13 that license their chatbot technology to a proprietor. 14 2. (a) A proprietor of a chatbot used as an alternative to a human 15 representative, or otherwise as an agent of the proprietor to provide 16 any substantive response, information, advice, or action on behalf of 17 the proprietor may not disclaim liability of any kind where a chatbot 18 provides materially misleading, incorrect, contradictory or harmful 19 information to a user that results in financial loss or other demonstra- 20 ble harm to the user; provided, however, that no such liability shall be 21 imposed where the proprietor has corrected the information and substan- 22 tially or completely cured the harm to the user within thirty days of 23 notice of such harm. EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets [ ] is old law to be omitted. LBD01914-01-5 
 A. 222 2 1 (b) The proprietor of a chatbot shall be responsible for ensuring such 2 chatbot accurately provides information aligned with the formal poli- 3 cies, product details, disclosures and terms of service offered to 4 users. 5 (c) A proprietor may not waive or disclaim this liability merely by 6 notifying consumers that they are interacting with a non-human chatbot 7 system. 8 3. Proprietors utilizing chatbots shall provide clear, conspicuous and 9 explicit notice to users that they are interacting with an artificial 10 intelligence chatbot program rather than a human representative. The 11 text of the notice shall appear in the same language and in a size easi- 12 ly readable by the average viewer and no smaller than the largest font 13 size of other text appearing on the website on which the chatbot is 14 utilized. 15 § 2. This act shall take effect on the ninetieth day after it shall 16 have become a law.