Minnesota SF 1857 (Minor Access to Chatbots 2025)

• Authority: Minnesota
• Parent authority: State governments
• Jurisdiction: United States
• Collections: U.S. state and local documents
• Most recent activity: Proposed
• Most recent activity date: 2025-02-24

Risk subdomain coverage

All other risk subdomains had no coverage in this document.

Risk Coverage Summary

This document has minimal explicit coverage of specific AI risk domains. While the prohibition on minor access to recreational chatbots suggests underlying concerns about potential harms to minors, the document does not explicitly articulate which specific risks (e.g., manipulation, overreliance, toxic content exposure) it aims to address. The law functions as a protective measure without detailed risk analysis.

Sector coverage

Good coverage — Comprehensive governance measures or mitigations with clear procedures relating to the sector are explicitly described.

• Information

Minimal coverage — Brief mention but no specific mitigations, recommendations or governance measures relating to the sector are described.

• Arts, Entertainment & Recreation

All other sectors had no coverage in this document.

Sectors Summary

The law primarily governs the Information sector, as it applies to entities that own or control websites, applications, software, or programs offering chatbot services—activities characteristic of technology, software, and digital service providers. The regulation is sector-neutral in its language but practically applies most directly to information technology and digital platform companies.

Legislative Status

Hard Law

Legislative Status Summary

This is binding legislation enacted by the Minnesota Legislature with mandatory prohibitions, explicit enforcement mechanisms including attorney general authority, civil penalties up to $5,000,000, and private rights of action.

Actors

Proposer

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: Minnesota Legislature
• Summary: The document is a legislative enactment by the Minnesota state legislature, as indicated by the opening clause describing formal legislative adoption.

Target

• Entity Types: AI_Developer, AI_Deployer
• Summary: The law targets any person who owns or controls websites, applications, software, or programs that offer chatbot services. These entities are both developers and deployers of AI systems (chatbots) and are subject to the prohibition and age verification requirements.

Enforcer

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor, Affected_Stakeholder
• Entities: Attorney General of Minnesota
• Summary: The statute provides two enforcement pathways: (1) the Attorney General has explicit authority to enforce under section 8.31 with penalties up to $5,000,000, and (2) any injured individual may bring a private civil action for damages and injunctive relief.

Monitor

• Entity Types: AI_Governance_Actor
• Entities: Attorney General of Minnesota
• Summary: While no explicit monitoring body is designated, the Attorney General's enforcement authority implicitly includes monitoring and investigation functions necessary to detect violations and bring enforcement actions.

AI Lifecycle Stages

Lifecycle stages covered by the documents, as defined in the OECD Framework for the Classification of AI Systems

• Deploy
• Operate and Monitor

AI Lifecycle Summary

The document focuses exclusively on the deployment and operational stages of chatbot systems. It does not address planning, design, data collection, model building, or validation stages. The requirements for age verification and restrictions on minor access apply to the deployment and ongoing operation of chatbot services.

Technical Scope

Terms relating to technical scope that are mentioned or implicitly referenced in the document

• Task-specific AI

Technical Scope Summary

The document explicitly defines and regulates 'chatbots' as computer programs designed to simulate conversation. It does not mention AI models, AI systems, frontier AI, general purpose AI, foundation models, generative AI, predictive AI, open-weight models, or compute thresholds. The focus is narrowly on conversational AI deployed for recreational purposes.