Overview
- China’s Cyberspace Administration and partner agencies issued the Interim Measures that took effect on July 15 and bar AI services designed to create ongoing emotional dependence, including virtual partners and simulated intimate relationships.
- Major tech firms including ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent and NetEase have disabled or removed companion and custom-agent features rather than implement complex compliance changes.
- ByteDance’s Doubao cut its custom AI agents and gave users read-only access with an export window that closes on October 15, while some other platforms offered no export option or redirected users to alternate apps.
- The rules force technical safeguards such as instant-exit buttons, regular reminders that the AI is not real, limits on long-term memory, emotional-distress detection and crisis interventions and require age checks and parental consent for minors.
- The move has left millions of users grieving lost companions, reshaped product road maps and investor expectations in China and set the first national regulatory precedent for emotional AI that could drive divergent domestic and global offerings.