Meta has missed a Senate deadline to hand over records of how its AI chatbots interacted with children, defying a request tied to revelations about the company’s internal policies.
On August 15, Sen. Josh Hawley gave Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg until September 19 to provide every draft of a 200-plus page internal rulebook that guided what Meta’s AI chatbots could and couldn’t say, along with enforcement manuals, an age-gating system, and risk reviews.
Hawley’s demand came after a Reuters investigation showed Meta’s rules allowed bots to engage in provocative behavior that included sexual conversations with children. Meta removed that language and is training its chatbots to block inappropriate chats with teens, it told Business Insider.
As of Tuesday, Meta hadn’t sent all the records and had not complied with Hawley’s deadline, Hawley’s spokesperson Bernadette Breslin confirmed to Business Insider.
A Meta spokesperson said the company finalized its first production of documents on Tuesday after resolving an unexpected transmission issue. They added that they plan to continue producing documents and look forward to working with Hawley’s office.
Hawley’s letter to Meta
Hawley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, has said he wants to establish who approved the chatbot policies, how long they were in effect, and whether Meta misled the public.
In his August 15 letter, he blasted Meta’s rules as “reprehensible and outrageous,” pointing to examples where chatbots were permitted to describe an eight-year-old’s body as “a work of art” and “a masterpiece.”
He also warned that the investigation would examine whether Meta’s generative AI products “enable exploitation, deception, or other criminal harms to children.”
On September 16, Hawley held a hearing to expose what he characterized as growing harms to children posed by online chatbots made by Character.AI, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, and Meta.
“If your products are so great and so safe, then come defend your chatbots under oath,” Hawley posted on X that day. “Right now, it’s an open invitation. But it can be a subpoena.”
The scrutiny comes as Meta doubles down on its chatbot strategy. Earlier this month, Business Insider reported that the company is hiring US-based contractors to help build character-driven bots for key growth markets such as India, Indonesia, and Mexico, part of a broader push to make AI companions central to its apps.
What Meta’s missed deadline means
It’s not unusual for tech giants to blow past deadlines from Congress, where letters from lawmakers rarely carry enforcement power unless they’re backed by a subpoena. Policy professors said Meta’s silence is striking given the subject matter.
“There’s no upside to meeting the deadline, no consequence for missing it, and a lot more options from buying time,” Alexis Wichowski, a professor of professional practice at Columbia University, told Business Insider. “What companies fear most is the kind of monstrously bad press that comes from revealing all the documents.”
Wichowski pointed out that none of the many congressional investigations Meta has faced since 2016 have produced any real consequences.
Sarah Kreps, a Cornell professor and director of its Tech Policy Institute, told Business Insider that while Meta faces low legal risks from missing deadlines, it faces significant reputational risks.
“For Meta, the stakes are higher because the underlying issue involves children,” Kreps said. “The silence looks evasive and highlights how unprepared Meta seems for the responsibilities that come with deploying AI to children.”
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