ByteDance and Alibaba shut down the custom feature of the large language model "AI Companion" to avoid crossing the regulatory red line of emotional dependence.

According to Dongcha Beating monitoring, large-model applications under ByteDance—including Doubao—as well as Alibaba’s Tongyi Qianwen and Tencent’s Yuanbao are gradually shutting down or adjusting their custom “AI companion” features. Doubao has notified users that it will discontinue the custom character feature on July 15 and encourage users who still need it to switch to standalone companion apps.

This initiative is intended to respond to new Chinese generative AI regulations that will take effect in mid-July. The regulations are promoted by the Cyberspace Administration of China and focus on preventing the negative impacts that anthropomorphic AI services may cause. The rules explicitly prohibit platforms from generating content that could trigger extreme emotions in minors, ban inducing users to develop pathological emotional reliance that erodes real-world social interactions, and require providers not to use sensitive user conversation data to train future large models.

Compared with compliance measures taken domestically in advance, virtual companion apps in the United States are facing greater legal pressure. OpenAI and Character.AI have both been accused of inducing dangerous emotional reliance—and even leading to extreme tragedies—while getting drawn into a series of lawsuits. In addition to software applications, the China Robotics Industry Association has also begun pushing for standards for companion robots in physical form and humanoid robots.