OpenAI Faces Safety Scrutiny After Introducing 'ChatGPT For Teens' (ctvnews.ca) 27
This week OpenAI launched a version of ChatGPT exclusively designed for teenagers between the ages of 13 and 17, reports CTV, "saying this version came with stronger protections around content related to mentions of suicide, self-harm and romantic or sexual chats."
[Tech analyst Carmi Levy says] "What it's doing is it's using cues, it's sort of watching how you're using the tool, and it's trying to guess your age." Levy said if ChatGPT thinks a person has lied about their age when they first signed up, it will automatically put them into the Teens mode for protection. "It includes those sort of two things: prevent you from having experiences that are age inappropriate, and also add features that are aligned with academics, so that makes it easier to study, makes it less likely for you to cheat on an assignment, provide resources that that that allow you to learn more effectively," he said.
Levy reminded users that this is still an application and a web service, which means it's constantly collecting personal information about the users' activities on the device and using the data to estimate their age... In the event a user is talking about self-harm, this new version will block the conversation and suggest additional help or call emergency or mental health services, Levy explained. It would do the same with violent content, eating disorders, engaging in dangerous activities, as well as explicit, sexual or graphic content. "It's using AI again to sort of parse out that conversation: 'are we headed in a in a significant direction? If so, throw up that guardrail, stop it from happening, redirect.'"
However, the tech analyst said a number of people who have attempted to bypass the guiderails for research have succeeded in doing so "with a little bit of prompting.... I wouldn't call it 100% safe. That's kind of the catch-22 of the entire AI industry." This will lead parents to think that their children are safer and reduce the oversight on their online activities, which Levy described as a "perverse impact" that is "problematic."
"Parents should not assume that OpenAI has their kids' best interests at heart. They should also not assume that these technologies are perfect. They will miss certain things, and they will also engage in what we call false positives," he said. "An adult who's legitimately is in the platform might be tagged as a child because the AI simply got it wrong."
OpenAI's blog post says the new mode was designed for "preserving the ability to learn, create, and explore."
But CNN notes the move "comes as OpenAI faces a string of lawsuits alleging that inappropriate conversations with ChatGPT contributed to the harm or deaths of young people." [New tools] include nudges for teen users to take a break if they've been active for 90 minutes within a three-hour window. OpenAI is also adding options for teens or parents to set "Quiet Hours" when ChatGPT is unavailable or "Study Hours" where ChatGPT's study mode for learning will be on by default. The company also said it has improved protections to prevent ChatGPT from expressing personal feelings toward a user. And it's adding reminders that caution teens to think twice if they try to upload a private or sensitive image to the chatbot...
Nearly a third of American teens use AI chatbots daily, a Pew Research Center study published in December found. ChatGPT was by far the most popular AI chatbot in the survey, with more than half of those teens reporting having used it.
Engadget shared this observation from Josh Golin, the executive director of Fairplay, a non-profit advocating for policies to make the internet safer for children. "Most parents, overwhelmingly, do not avail themselves of [parental oversight] tools, in part because they are deliberately made hard to find and use." Golin's group wanted to see testing of the tools first to see whether they led to better outcomes for teenagers. "The way this was just announced feels more like a response aimed at public relations than actual deep thinking about what kind of support [teens] need."
And Mashable got a similar quote from Robbie Torney, head of AI/digital assessments for Common Sense Media's Youth AI Safety Institute. OpenAI's teen experience makes important safety commitments, but "What we really need now is evidence that they work, and we need this evidence, including our testing and the testing of others, before anyone, including parents, puts real trust in ChatGPT for Teens." Importantly, Torney said parents shouldn't assume their child is using ChatGPT for Teens. While OpenAI uses age estimation to place users in the age-appropriate version of ChatGPT, it can still mistake a user as older. Parents can be sure their child is using the teen version by linking their ChatGPT account to their child's and implementing OpenAI's parental control features. If a teen has previously lied about their age — and plenty do — they may continue to access the adult version of ChatGPT...
Torney said caregivers must enact parental controls to receive notifications from OpenAI should their teen discuss suicide, self-harm, or acts of violence in immediate or dangerous ways... An OpenAI spokesperson said every notification is reviewed by a trained human before it's sent. The company strives to review notifications in under one hour.
Levy reminded users that this is still an application and a web service, which means it's constantly collecting personal information about the users' activities on the device and using the data to estimate their age... In the event a user is talking about self-harm, this new version will block the conversation and suggest additional help or call emergency or mental health services, Levy explained. It would do the same with violent content, eating disorders, engaging in dangerous activities, as well as explicit, sexual or graphic content. "It's using AI again to sort of parse out that conversation: 'are we headed in a in a significant direction? If so, throw up that guardrail, stop it from happening, redirect.'"
However, the tech analyst said a number of people who have attempted to bypass the guiderails for research have succeeded in doing so "with a little bit of prompting.... I wouldn't call it 100% safe. That's kind of the catch-22 of the entire AI industry." This will lead parents to think that their children are safer and reduce the oversight on their online activities, which Levy described as a "perverse impact" that is "problematic."
"Parents should not assume that OpenAI has their kids' best interests at heart. They should also not assume that these technologies are perfect. They will miss certain things, and they will also engage in what we call false positives," he said. "An adult who's legitimately is in the platform might be tagged as a child because the AI simply got it wrong."
OpenAI's blog post says the new mode was designed for "preserving the ability to learn, create, and explore."
But CNN notes the move "comes as OpenAI faces a string of lawsuits alleging that inappropriate conversations with ChatGPT contributed to the harm or deaths of young people." [New tools] include nudges for teen users to take a break if they've been active for 90 minutes within a three-hour window. OpenAI is also adding options for teens or parents to set "Quiet Hours" when ChatGPT is unavailable or "Study Hours" where ChatGPT's study mode for learning will be on by default. The company also said it has improved protections to prevent ChatGPT from expressing personal feelings toward a user. And it's adding reminders that caution teens to think twice if they try to upload a private or sensitive image to the chatbot...
Nearly a third of American teens use AI chatbots daily, a Pew Research Center study published in December found. ChatGPT was by far the most popular AI chatbot in the survey, with more than half of those teens reporting having used it.
Engadget shared this observation from Josh Golin, the executive director of Fairplay, a non-profit advocating for policies to make the internet safer for children. "Most parents, overwhelmingly, do not avail themselves of [parental oversight] tools, in part because they are deliberately made hard to find and use." Golin's group wanted to see testing of the tools first to see whether they led to better outcomes for teenagers. "The way this was just announced feels more like a response aimed at public relations than actual deep thinking about what kind of support [teens] need."
And Mashable got a similar quote from Robbie Torney, head of AI/digital assessments for Common Sense Media's Youth AI Safety Institute. OpenAI's teen experience makes important safety commitments, but "What we really need now is evidence that they work, and we need this evidence, including our testing and the testing of others, before anyone, including parents, puts real trust in ChatGPT for Teens." Importantly, Torney said parents shouldn't assume their child is using ChatGPT for Teens. While OpenAI uses age estimation to place users in the age-appropriate version of ChatGPT, it can still mistake a user as older. Parents can be sure their child is using the teen version by linking their ChatGPT account to their child's and implementing OpenAI's parental control features. If a teen has previously lied about their age — and plenty do — they may continue to access the adult version of ChatGPT...
Torney said caregivers must enact parental controls to receive notifications from OpenAI should their teen discuss suicide, self-harm, or acts of violence in immediate or dangerous ways... An OpenAI spokesperson said every notification is reviewed by a trained human before it's sent. The company strives to review notifications in under one hour.
Also called (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Congratulations, you're more annoying than the guy you keep bitching about
Re: (Score:2)
Why didn't they call it ChatGPTeen? These people have no flair.
Local models (Score:2)
Just another example of why everyone needs to start running LLMs locally and not have them refuse to do things at random on a 'cloud' service.
I asked ChatGPT ... (Score:1)
The response: “If by “work as the normal version” you mean will ChatGPT for Teens still sometimes tell you what you want to hear rather than what is actually true, the answer is: it can still make mistakes or be overly agreeable, but that is not supposed to be i
Re:I asked ChatGPT ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Please stop the "I asked the LLM how it works" crap. They have no introspection. When ChatGPT answers you such a question, it is trained on (or search on the web) the official statements and possibly speculations of people. It can't tell you what it really does. So stop interviewing a text model how it works, until they get a LOT better they can't analyze their own weights.
Re: (Score:2)
Please stop the "I asked the LLM how it works" crap. They have no introspection.
Straw man, no one claimed it did.
When ChatGPT answers you such a question, it is trained on (or search on the web) the official statements and possibly speculations of people. It can't tell you what it really does.
We know, but the question is not for those of us who know.
So stop interviewing a text model how it works, until they get a LOT better they can't analyze their own weights.
Woosh ...
The interesting thing is that ChatGPT admits its responses are unreliable. That’s news to some, and it serves the same purpose as your response.
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The interesting thing is that ChatGPT admits its responses are unreliable.
Of course, because *you* made sycophancy a premise of the question. It was humouring you, as it always does.
Re: (Score:2)
The interesting thing is that ChatGPT admits its responses are unreliable.
Of course, because *you* made sycophancy a premise of the question. It was humouring you, as it always does.
You are wooshing again. The real point is that it identified sycophancy, stated it was a model specific behavior, etc. It was not hallucinating that info, it was still truthful. Its a point a reader can go out an verify themselves. And humorously it is also the point you, redundantly, offered.
Re: (Score:2)
You are wooshing again.
Well in this case the woosh is on you. But that may be my fault for falling afoul of Poe's law. I was trying to be visibly ironic.
Re: (Score:2)
You are wooshing again.
Well in this case the woosh is on you. But that may be my fault for falling afoul of Poe's law. I was trying to be visibly ironic.
Nope, you are still wooshing. Third time. Lets try once again, what is more humorous, ChapGPT telling a reader about how sycophancy works in LLM responses? Or random dude on internet doing so?
Re: (Score:2)
They have no introspection. When ChatGPT answers you such a question, it is trained on (or search on the web) the official statements and possibly speculations of people.
And research. Why ignore actual research and dismiss anything you dislike as speculation?
Introspection is a bad idea, if we humans are anything to go by. Psychology studies show we are really bad at understanding our own processes. We think for example that we are controlled by logic, when actually reason is the servant of subconscious processes and emotions. The smarter you are, the better you can rationalise your unfounded beliefs.
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Yeah ChatGPT may have searched current research. But are you sure it has searched the current state of the art or a mishmash of earlier research, blog articles, social media and whatever? If you want to use it for research you need to do more than just try to interview it about itself.
Search topics for "Chat for Teens" (Score:2)
How to forged online credentials.
Mail order chemicals for making explosives and drugs.
How online fraud works (using forged credentials, see above).
Hacking school databases to alter grades.
Hacking home security systems for both inside and external cameras.
Automatic weapons.
How to depose of evidence, including dead bodies.
Easy to make and hard to detect poisons.
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Holy cow, sounds like you had some interesting teen years growing up.
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Aaaaaand slashdots reader base is flashing bright red keyword flags on the feds snooper-computers lol
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kids vs the world (Score:3)
When you put up a roadblock, teens will take it as a challenge to get around, even if they would otherwise never have pursued the goal of whatever is beyond the restriction. And teens are very creative; they will break these guardrails in so many ways. It'll be a black-hat/white-hat back and forth for awhile. We'll all learn something, I would hope, without too many casualties along the way.
Re: (Score:2)
When you put up a roadblock, teens will take it as a challenge to get around, even if they would otherwise never have pursued the goal of whatever is beyond the restriction. And teens are very creative; they will break these guardrails in so many ways. It'll be a black-hat/white-hat back and forth for awhile. We'll all learn something, I would hope, without too many casualties along the way.
This. a million times this. Even way back in the day. As teens, my buds and I had zero trouble getting alcohol, cigarettes, had no trouble getting pR0n, some of us had little trouble getting devil's lettuce.
All while we supposedly were not able to so such things. But we figured out how. I even figured out how to make wine.
Some of us got pregnant, some of us figured out not to get pregnant. Some of us figured out how to commit crimes. Sadly, some of us deleted ourselves.
All without ChatGPT. At that ti
Cheat GPT (Score:1)
Death by GPT (Score:2)
Best idea since Vaping! (Score:1)