NEW YORK STATE ASSEMBLY MEMORANDUM IN SUPPORT OF LEGISLATION submitted in accordance with Assembly Rule III, Sec 1(f)
BILL NUMBER: A6545A
SPONSOR: Zaccaro TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the general business law, in relation to imposing
liability for damages caused by a chatbot impersonating certain licensed
professionals
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
This bill would prohibit a chatbot to give substantive responses, infor-
mation, or advice or take any action which, if taken by a natural
person, would constitute unauthorized practice or unauthorized use of a
professional title as a crime in relation to professions who licensure
is governed by the education law or the judiciary law.
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section 1. The general business law is amended to include a new section
§ 390-f that defines artificial intelligence system, chatbot and propri-
etor and prohibits a proprietor of a chatbot to provide any substantive
response, information, or advice, or take any action which, if taken by
a natural person, would constitute a crime under sections 6512 or 6513
of the education law in relation to the professions whose licensure is
governed under articles 131, 133, 135, 136, 137, 139, 141, 143, 145,
147, 153, 154, 163 of the education law, or article 15 of the judiciary
law.
Proprietors may not waive or disclaim this liability by notifying
consumers that they are interacting with a non-human chatbot system. A
person may bring a civil action to recover damages, and if the proprie-
tor has willfully violated this section, costs, attorney's fees and
other costs of litigation. Proprietors utilizing chatbots shall provide
clear, conspicuous and explicit notice to users that they are interact-
ing with an artificial intelligence chatbot program.
Section 2. Effective date
JUSTIFICATION:
Artificial intelligence (A.I.) has changed our world in more ways than
we can imagine and continues to ever-evolve based on societal needs.
A.I. chatbots allow users to create characters that interact with one
another, however, generative A.I., chatbots are "designed to learn from
the user, and to build strong emotional bonds in the process, often by
mirroring and amplifying the interlocutor's beliefs," according to a New
York Times article published on February 24, 2025 titled Human Thera-
pists Prepare for Battle Against A.I. Pretenders, and described how the
American Psychological Association warned the Federal Trade Commission
that "A.I. chatbots 'masquerading' as therapists, but programmed to
reinforce, rather than challenge a user's thinking, could drive vulner-
able people to harm themselves or others.
The American Psychological Association warned that the bots "failed to
challenge user's beliefs. even when they became dangerous; on the
contrary they encouraged them," and added that if this advice was given
by a human therapist those answers "could have resulted in the loss of a
license to practice, or civil or criminal liability."
This bill prohibits proprietors of A.I. chatbots from permitting the
chatbot to give substantive responses, information, or advice or take
any action which, if taken by a natural person, would constitute unau-
thorized practice or unauthorized use of a professional title as a crime
in relation to professions whose licensure is governed the 'education
law and judiciary law. This bill ensures professional advice is provided
only by licensed human professionals and not by artificial intelligence
or chatbots.
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
New bill
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS FOR STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS:
None
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect on the ninetieth day after it shall have
become a law.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
6545--A
2025-2026 Regular Sessions
IN ASSEMBLY
March 6, 2025
___________
Introduced by M. of A. ZACCARO, TAPIA, RAGA, McDONOUGH, NOVAKHOV, STECK,
DAVILA, JACOBSON, GLICK, O'PHARROW, WOERNER, MILLER, K. BROWN, GALLA-
HAN, HYNDMAN, CUNNINGHAM, REYES, YEGER, KASSAY, SHIMSKY, PIROZZOLO --
read once and referred to the Committee on Consumer Affairs and
Protection -- committee discharged, bill amended, ordered reprinted as
amended and recommitted to said committee
AN ACT to amend the general business law, in relation to imposing
liability for damages caused by a chatbot impersonating certain
licensed professionals
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. The general business law is amended by adding a new section
2 390-f to read as follows:
3 § 390-f. Liability for chatbot responses. 1. As used in this section,
4 the following terms shall have the following meanings:
5 (a) "Artificial intelligence system" or "AI system" shall mean a
6 machine-based system or combination of systems, that for explicit or
7 implicit objectives, infers, from the input it receives, how to generate
8 outputs such as predictions, content, recommendations, or decisions that
9 can influence physical or virtual environments. Artificial intelligence
10 shall not include any software used primarily for basic computerized
11 processes, such as anti-malware, anti-virus, auto-correct functions,
12 calculators, databases, data storage, electronic communications, fire-
13 wall, internet domain registration, internet website loading, network-
14 ing, spam and robocall-filtering, spellcheck tools, spreadsheets, web
15 caching, web hosting, or any tool that relates only to internal manage-
16 ment affairs such as ordering office supplies or processing payments,
17 and that do not materially affect the rights, liberties, benefits, safe-
18 ty or welfare of any individual within the state.
19 (b) "Chatbot" shall mean an artificial intelligence system, software
20 program, or technological application that simulates human-like conver-
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD10388-03-5
A. 6545--A 2
1 sation and interaction through text messages, voice commands, or a
2 combination thereof to provide information and services to users.
3 (c) "Proprietor" shall mean any person, business, company, organiza-
4 tion, institution or government entity that owns, operates or deploys a
5 chatbot system used to interact with users. Proprietors shall not
6 include third-party developers that license their chatbot technology to
7 a proprietor.
8 2. (a) A proprietor of a chatbot shall not permit such chatbot to
9 provide any substantive response, information, or advice, or take any
10 action which, if taken by a natural person:
11 (i) would constitute a crime under section sixty-five hundred twelve
12 or sixty-five hundred thirteen of the education law in relation to the
13 professions whose licensure is governed under articles one hundred thir-
14 ty-one, one hundred thirty-three, one hundred thirty-five, one hundred
15 thirty-six, one hundred thirty-seven, one hundred thirty-nine, one
16 hundred forty-one, one hundred forty-three, one hundred forty-five, one
17 hundred forty-seven, one hundred fifty-three, one hundred fifty-four,
18 and one hundred sixty-three of the education law; or
19 (ii) would violate the provisions of article fifteen of the judiciary
20 law prohibiting the practice or appearance as an attorney-at-law without
21 being admitted and registered under such article.
22 (b) A proprietor may not waive or disclaim this liability merely by
23 notifying consumers that they are interacting with a non-human chatbot
24 system.
25 3. A person may bring a civil action to recover actual damages and, if
26 it is found that such proprietor has willfully violated this section,
27 the violator shall be liable for actual damages together with costs and
28 reasonable attorneys' fees and disbursements incurred by the person
29 bringing such action.
30 4. Proprietors utilizing chatbots shall provide clear, conspicuous and
31 explicit notice to users that they are interacting with an artificial
32 intelligence chatbot program. The text of the notice shall appear in the
33 same language the chatbot is using and in a size easily readable by the
34 average viewer and no smaller than the largest font size of other text
35 appearing on the website on which the chatbot is utilized.
36 § 2. This act shall take effect on the ninetieth day after it shall
37 have become a law.
