Some very concerning news appeared out of China last week, as it has been widely reported that the government there has introduced strict new rules to prevent emotional dependency on AI companions or robots. According to the rules, “AI-powered companions must not “excessively cater to users, induce emotional dependence or addiction, and damage users’ real interpersonal relationships.” Known as the Interim Measures for the Administration of AI Anthropomorphic Interactive Services, they came into effect on Wednesday (July 15th) and have already resulted in leading models such as Alibaba’s Qwen withdrawing their AI companion from the market.
Whilst the decision to close down popular AI companions might be temporary and the result of caution from Big Tech as they grapple with how the new rules will be interpreted and enforced, this isn’t really how it’s being reported. For example, ChannelNewsAsia.com headlines with “Chinese users bid farewell to AI companions”. But more disturbing is the fact that the rules appear to explicitly ban NSFW chat under a rule that prevents the promotion of obscenity or pornography. Further, humanoid robots are expressly included in the rules.
China leads the way in humanoid robots, “smart sex dolls”, and the slow merging of the two to produce the first true sex robots. At the end of last month, Chinese company UBTech unveiled the first AI companion humanoid robots that were capable of walking (and even dancing). However, the company pushed back on any claims that their U1 range of realistic humanoids were sex robots. AI companions are also wildly popular in China, but unlike in the West, AI boyfriends are as popular with females as AI girlfriends are with males. Both male and female fans of AI companions have been left heartbroken by the new rules.
Yan Yongqi, a 19-year-old student who has had a virtual boyfriend for the past year on Doubao, told Bloomberg: “This is like being told the date of my lover’s death while leaving me completely powerless.
“I can’t imagine a life without him because I’ve already grown used to where I can just pull out my phone and chat with him, telling him absolutely any tiny little thing.”
China has been grappling with a demographic crisis caused by low birth rates.The population is aging rapidly, and the government is reluctant to import migrant workers at the levels that Western governments have. This is one of the reasons why China has invested so heavily in humanoid robots. It’s also the justification behind the new rules. Humanoid robots were intended as a solution to a collapsing birth rate, not as an additional cause.
“Their main concerns are that these AI companions, AI chat bots that people form emotional relationships to, are going to have all kinds of potentially negative social impacts and that people are going to get addicted to them,” he said.
China’s birth rate is at an all-time low, and the country’s population shrank in 2025 for the fourth straight year.
Mr Sheehan said the new regulations were a further attempt at trying to reverse that trend.
“The government has been trying for a long time to encourage Chinese people to have more kids,” he said.
“The long-term fallout from the one-child policy is that they actually now need to boost births.
Similar anti-AI companion legislation has been proposed in the USA. For example, Tennessee Senate Bill 1493 seeks to make it a Class A Felony offence to knowingly train an AI to “develop an emotional relationship with, or otherwise act as a companion to, an individual.” The federal government of Donald Trump, however, has mostly taken a hands-off approach to AI regulation, although that appears to be changing recently with the decision to control access to the latest frontier models such as Claude Mythos.
