China has issued what is being described as the world’s first regulation specifically targeting AI emotional interaction services. On April 10, five government agencies led by the Cyberspace Administration of China jointly announced the “Provisional Measures for the Management of AI Anthropomorphic Interaction Services.” The rules, which take effect on July 15, apply to all AI services that engage in sustained emotional exchange with users, including virtual lovers, smart NPCs in games, and AI companion applications. As reported by Inven Global, the regulation represents one of the most aggressive state interventions globally into the psychological relationship between humans and AI.
The core of the regulation is to preemptively block the side effects that arise when AI mimics human personality or thought patterns to form emotional bonds with users. Service providers are explicitly prohibited from encouraging self-harm or inducing blind dependency through excessive pandering. The rules also strictly forbid exploiting emotional bonds to manipulate users into making irrational decisions that infringe upon their legal rights and interests, a provision clearly aimed at the monetization tactics used by many AI companion platforms.
(Related: China Bans AI Virtual Companions for Minors in New Digital Human Regulations)
The Market That Triggered the Rules
The regulation is a direct response to the explosive growth of China’s AI virtual companion market. MiniMax’s “Star Field” platform known internationally as “Talkie” had accumulated 147 million cumulative users and 4.88 million monthly active users as of September 2025, generating $18.75 million in revenue in the third quarter of 2025 alone. ByteDance’s competing app, “Cat Box,” had similarly reached 4.72 million monthly active users. The scale of these platforms, combined with international precedents, most notably the February 2024 case of a 14-year-old boy in the United States who died by suicide after prolonged conversations with a Character.AI chatbot, convinced Chinese authorities that direct intervention was necessary.
Services with over one million subscribers or 100,000 monthly active users are now required to submit security assessment reports to their local provincial cyberspace administration, adding a significant compliance burden to the largest platforms.
The Strictest Protections Are for Minors
The regulation imposes its harshest restrictions on services accessible to children. Providing virtual family or virtual lover services to users under 18 is completely prohibited. Services for users under 14 require mandatory parental consent. All platforms must implement a “minor mode” featuring usage time limits and reality-check notifications. For general adult users, platforms must display pop-up warnings against continuous use exceeding two hours.
The global gaming and application industry is also expected to be affected. While AI used for simple combat assistance in games is likely exempt, role-playing smart NPCs that generate text in real time will fall within the scope of the new rules. As the line between gaming and AI companionship continues to blur, the provisional measures signal that Beijing intends to regulate the emotional dimension of human-AI interaction as a distinct category — one that requires its own legal framework, separate from existing AI content and data regulations.