Attorney General Ellison releases report on AI and social media’s effects on young people

Report describes harms caused, traces those harms to specific design features, and recommends solutions to state legislature

February 4, 2025 (SAINT PAUL) – Today, Attorney General Keith Ellison released a report detailing the harmful effects that emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and social media are having on young Minnesotans. The report examines the harms these technologies cause, analyzes the specific design features causing those harms, evaluates previous legislative efforts to correct these issues, and provides policy recommendations for the Minnesota legislature that will curb these harms and improve the well-being of young Minnesotans.

This report is a follow-up to Attorney General Ellison’s award-winning 2024 report on the same subject, linked here. This year’s report expands on last year’s report in numerous ways, including by delving more into the rapidly changing landscape of tools powered by artificial intelligence and how those tools are being used by and causing harm to children and teenagers. This is more important than ever since a 2024 study found that 70% of youth ages 13-18 reported using generative AI and that 24% reported using AI chatbots at least several times a week.

“I am deeply concerned that our society is failing young people by not taking strong enough action to protect them from manipulation, exploitation, and bullying online,” said Attorney General Ellison. “No parent in Minnesota would willingly sign their child up to be a guinea pig for tech companies testing new, powerful, and dangerous technologies, yet that is exactly what has been happening with developments in social media and artificial intelligence. We must continue to establish reasonable guardrails to protect young people online and prevent tech companies from sacrificing the well-being of children and teenagers just to turn a profit. Young Minnesotans deserve far better.”

The Minnesota Legislature commissioned the first report in 2023 and required the Attorney General to deliver it by February 1, 2024. See 2023 Minn. Laws, Chapter 57, Art. 1, § 4, subd. 3 (Report). Following the release of the first report, the Legislature commissioned a second report.

Structure and analysis of the report

The 2025 Report on Emerging Technology and Its Effects on Youth Well-Being is written to equip Minnesotans and policymakers with a comprehensive understanding of social media and AI’s impact on the mental and physical health of young people. The report also analyzes the effects these technologies have on marginalized communities in particular, examines the efficacy of prior efforts to regulate these technologies, and provides a set of policy recommendations to lawmakers.

Section 1 examines the specific impacts that emerging technologies are having on young people, and tracks those harms to specific functions and design choices of technology products. The specific harms and problems described by this report include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Many consumers, especially youth, are experiencing online bullying and harassment.
• Many consumers are having unwanted disturbing, graphic, and sexual content related experiences because of AI-powered algorithms.
• Many users are experiencing envy and other negative feelings because platforms are designed to perpetuate social comparison.
• Many cases of manipulation and fraud are initiated by unwanted contact facilitated by loss of privacy defaults and high-rate limits. Unwanted contact with young people has had increasingly serious impacts on their well-being.
• Platforms enable misuse of user information and images.
• Platform systems are designed to optimize users time and attention in ways that negatively impact sleep and other healthy activities.
• Algorithms exhibit biases which are increasingly present in the integration of AI tools.
• Marginalized communities are more likely to report negative experiences and increased harms on social media platforms.

Section 2 describes legislative efforts proposed or enacted across America and across the world to curb these problems and improve the experience of young people online. Understanding the legislative landscape will provide policymakers with insights on forming safer solutions.

Section 3 evaluates what worked well and what fell short in previous legislative and regulatory efforts to protect young people online. The section uses that analysis to suggest specific areas where Minnesota lawmakers can improve on those previous efforts, including:

• Avoiding vague statutory language that will be difficult to implement and increase opportunities for legal challenges.
• Avoiding overly prescriptive solutions to avoid misuse or other negative impacts.
• Limiting broad reporting requirements and identifying ways to preserve the privacy and free expression of minors.
• Outlining alternative mechanisms to enforcement and limiting the use of ineffective opt-out policies.
• Constructing policies regulating design functions rather than regulations related to content.

Section 4 details the specific problems that emerging AI tools are causing for young people, with a focus on the expansive and unregulated use of chatbots, as well as the ability of generative AI to create harmful fake photos and videos, including sexually explicit imagery.

Section 5 refines the previous recommendation posed in the first report, which include:

• Prohibiting the use of “deceptive patterns” which compel greater usage through features like infinite scroll, auto-play, and aggressive notifications.
• Providing users with tools to limit deceptive design features and mandate privacy defaults that limit the sharing of unwanted data, images or explicit visuals.
• Limiting the use of engagement-based optimization algorithms that incentivize users to increase time spent on platforms.
• Requiring increased transparency regarding the usage of rate limit and product experimentation features.
• Empowering users and guardians by implementing intuitive devise-based defaults.
• Observing patterns between user experiences and platform specific design features.
• Advocating for limited technology usage in educational settings.

Background on the Report

In 2023, the Minnesota Legislature directed the Attorney General’s Office to research and prepare a report on the effect of new and emerging technologies on the well-being of Minnesotans.

The Legislature required that the report accomplish the following goals:

• Evaluate the impact of technology companies and their products on the mental health and well-being of Minnesotans, with a focus on children;
• Discuss proposed and enacted consumer protection laws related to the regulation of technology companies in other jurisdictions;
• Include policy recommendations to the Minnesota legislature.

This report was created with the help and support of the exceptional and highly experienced, Dr. Ravi Iyer. Dr. Iyer is a technologist, and academic psychologist, who is currently managing director of USC Marshall School’s Neely Center for Ethical Leadership and Decision Making. Prior to this, he worked for Meta (which owns Facebook and Instagram) and has published multiple scholarly articles on the impacts of technology related harms. A law clerk with the Attorney General’s Office, Alyssa Padmanabhan, also provided assistance that was crucial to writing this report, while in her third year at the University of St. Thomas School of Law.

Attorney General Ellison urges Minnesotans to use this form to continue sharing their stories about the negative effects social media platforms (such as Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, and others) are having on children and teenagers.