U.S. Senators Katie Britt, Brian Schatz, Colleagues Press AI Companies to Improve Transparency, Commit to Timely Consistent Safety Disclosures

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senators Katie Britt (R-Ala.) and Brain Schatz (D-Hawaii) called on leading artificial intelligence (AI) companies to improve transparency around the capabilities of their models and the risks they pose to users.

In letters to OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, Anthropic, Meta, Luka, Character.AI, and xAI, the Senators highlighted reports of AI chatbots encouraging dangerous behavior among children, including suicidal ideation and self-harm, and requested commitments to timely, consistent disclosures around model releases as well as long-term research into chatbots' impacts on the emotional and psychological wellbeing of users.

"If AI companies struggle to predict and mitigate relatively well-understood risks, it raises concerns about their ability to manage more complex risks," the Senators wrote. "While we have been encouraged by the arrival of overdue safety measures for certain chatbots, these must be accompanied by improved public self-reporting so that consumers, families, educators, and policymakers can make informed decisions around appropriate use."

"Public disclosure reports, such as AI model and system cards, serve as the closest equivalent to nutrition labels for AI models. While they are essential public transparency tools, today's changed landscape calls for assessing current best practices and how they can be better responsive to user risks … Companies must continue to monitor their model performance and publicly disclose new developments as they relate to security and user safety. This information enables third-party evaluators to assess a model's risks and supports organizations, governments, and consumers in making more informed decisions," the Senators continued.

In addition to Senators Britt and Schatz, the letter was signed by Senators James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Chris Coons (D-Del.). The full text of the letter is below and available here.

Senator Britt has long demanded that Congress hold Big Tech accountable for putting profits over the safety of children, recently asking during an interview, "How many parents do we have to have come in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee and others telling us the heartbreaking story of losing their children before we act?"

She has been a leading voice on this issue, introducing several pieces of legislation that would protect adolescents online. Recently, she joined Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) in introducing bipartisan legislation to protect minors from AI chatbots and has sponsored a number of other bipartisan bills including the Stop the Scroll Act and the Kids Off Social Media Act.

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