Google’s Gemini AI will soon be accessible to kids under 13 — here’s how that could look
Google is looking to gain some younger users of its AI tools with the company confirming Gemini will soon roll out to children under the age of 13, as per the New York Times.
This comes at a time when AI companies are all looking to seize some extra traffic in a crowded marketplace. However, there will — thankfully — be rules in place for kids planning to start using Gemini to help them with their homework.
Most importantly, Gemini will only be available to children whose parents use Family Link. This is a parental control system made by Google. Through the platform, parents can manage how long children spend on certain apps and manage the settings of what they can access.
What will this look like?
While it is not immediately clear what rules have been put in place for these children using Gemini, Google has already said that it won’t use their activity to train its models.
Google has previously outlined its position of child safety and AI, publishing a blog post in late 2023. At this time, Google was using its AI model, Bard. While things have changed since then, the focus was on identifying topics that were inappropriate for children and adding safety guardrails to this.
The AI model also utilised a double check feature, where questions that were factual were reanalysed before giving the answer. With an even younger crowd, these types of safety measures will be even more important.
“Gemini Apps will soon be available for your child,” the company said in an email this week to the parent of an 8-year-old, reported in the New York Times. “That means your child will be able to use Gemini to ask questions, get homework help, and make up stories.”
Google acknowledged some risks in its email to families this week, alerting parents that “Gemini can make mistakes” and suggesting they “help [their] child think critically” about the chatbot.
Going on to recommend how to use it, Google encouraged parents to teach their children how to fact-check Gemini’s answers, highlighting that Gemini isn’t human and that children should not give sensitive or personal information to Gemini.
While Gemini will attempt to filter inappropriate material, this remains the biggest concern with this kind of update. AI can still accidentally offer content that is deemed inappropriate, or as Google puts it, your children “may encounter content you don’t want them to see”.
While Gemini will be automatically available to these children under 13, parents will be notified when they start using it. From here, they can decide how much access is granted, including turning it off completely.
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