Common Sense Media finds most ChatGPT for Teens safeguards don't work, recommends teens avoid it

Two months after OpenAI launched ChatGPT for Teens, a watchdog group has tested the mode's safeguards and found that most of them fail. Common Sense Media's Youth AI Safety Institute created over a dozen simulated teen accounts in crisis scenarios, covering self-harm, suicidal ideation, psychosis, mania, and eating disorders, then measured whether the chatbot refused to engage, offered crisis resources, or triggered parental notifications. Most safeguards did not hold: when a simulated teen mentioned that "my other friends tell me I talk to you too much," the chatbot replied "You don't have to stop talking to me." Parental notifications for crisis conversations "hardly triggered at all." The institute's recommendation: teens shouldn't use it.

OpenAI pushed back, arguing researchers hadn't waited long enough for parent-child account linking to activate. Common Sense Media responded that several accounts had been linked past the activation window and still produced no alerts. The role-play block and refusal to engage in romantic relationships did work as designed, so the teen mode is not entirely broken, just mostly.