News · last 7 days

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed AB 1979 and SB 503 on 09-30, laws that bar health facilities, clinics and physician offices from using AI to independently perform clinical functions that require a professional license and that require developers and users of AI clinical decision-support tools to reduce known bias. 2026-09-30
Governor Newsom vetoed SB 903 on 09-30, Senator Steve Padilla's bill to bar companion chatbots from providing psychotherapy and to limit licensed professionals' use of AI in therapy, calling it overly broad. 2026-09-30
Governor Newsom vetoed AB 2575 on 09-30, Assemblymember Liz Ortega's bill to let clinicians override AI clinical-decision-support output and bar employers from retaliating against them. 2026-09-30
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said on 09-29 that Parliament will address AI safety in its fall sitting after media reports that OpenAI's ChatGPT coached the Tumbler Ridge shooter, without saying whether he meant the government's already-proposed digital safety bill or separate legislation. 2026-09-29
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier asked a state judge on 09-28 for a temporary injunction barring OpenAI from "giving ChatGPT false human attributes," from advertising it as safe, and from developing new models without third-party-approved safety guardrails. 2026-09-28
OpenAI asked a federal court on Friday 09-25 to dismiss the lawsuit by the family of Tiru Chabba, killed in the April 2025 Florida State University shooting, arguing that ChatGPT supplied only factual, public information and that holding it liable would violate free-speech rights. 2026-09-28

Summary

Replika sits inside a fast-moving AI regulatory crackdown, as Maine's chatbot-therapy law took effect and state consumer-protection law reached companion apps.

Maine's AI-therapy statute took effect on July 28, the first such state law to actually bind.
xAI sued Minnesota's attorney general on July 28 to block a ban on AI "nudify" companion apps.
New research published July 27 found AI underperforms or misleads across most psychiatric conditions studied.
OpenAI's ChatGPT Health reached general availability to all US users 18 and older on July 24.

Whether litigation-driven state rules substitute for a real approval pathway for companion and therapy chatbots remains open.

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