Mark Halperin Urges AI Rules for Children, Citing Meta's $18 Billion Social Media Lesson
Updated
Updated · Fox News · Sep 5
Mark Halperin Urges AI Rules for Children, Citing Meta's $18 Billion Social Media Lesson
1 articles · Updated · Fox News · Sep 5
Summary
Halperin warned that AI could harm children before regulators catch up, arguing the bigger risk is not only what chatbots tell minors but what minors reveal to them.
He said social media offers the clearest precedent: platforms were allowed to scale first, evidence of harm to children came later, and only then did companies and lawmakers respond.
Meta's recent settlement — with payouts of up to $18 billion and promised changes to youth access — is, in his view, proof that waiting for damage before acting is the wrong model for AI.
Halperin called for parents to know when children use AI, mandatory disclosure when a child is interacting with a machine, and strict limits on collecting, retaining and engagement-optimizing minors' data.
He argued those safeguards can coexist with U.S. competition against China, saying protecting 12-year-olds from manipulative AI is not the same as surrendering the broader AI race.