Idaho’s Conversational AI Safety Act (SB 1297) takes effect July 1, 2026, establishing one of the first state-level regulatory frameworks specifically targeting chatbot safety. Governor Brad Little signed the bill on April 2 after it passed both chambers of the Idaho legislature, according to the Transparency Coalition’s legislative tracker and BillTrack50.
What the Law Requires
The full text of the bill, published by Tally Idaho, establishes four categories of requirements for operators of conversational AI services:
AI disclosure. If reasonable persons would be misled into believing they are interacting with a human, operators must “clearly and conspicuously disclose” that the service is artificial intelligence.
Suicide prevention protocols. Operators must adopt protocols for responding to user prompts regarding suicidal ideation, including making reasonable efforts to refer users to crisis services such as suicide hotlines or crisis text lines.
No mental health misrepresentation. Operators cannot knowingly cause a conversational AI service to represent that it is designed to provide professional mental or behavioral health care.
Minor-specific protections. When an operator knows or has “reasonable certainty” that an account holder is under 18, additional requirements apply: persistent visible disclaimers or session-start disclosures repeated every three hours, restrictions on sexually explicit content generation, prohibitions on variable reward schedules designed to increase engagement, and limits on notifications during overnight hours (midnight to 6 AM in the minor’s time zone).
What’s Exempt
The law carves out significant exemptions. It does not apply to: developer or researcher tools, features embedded within other non-conversational software, narrow-topic applications, enterprise/commercial products, voice assistants for consumer electronics, internal business tools, or services accessible only through commercial agreements, according to the bill text. The exemptions effectively scope the law to consumer-facing general-purpose chatbots.
The Health AI Policy Institute rated the bill’s healthcare impact as “High,” noting it creates direct safety and disclosure duties for consumer AI systems used for emotional support or mental-health-adjacent conversations.
The Broader Legislative Wave
Idaho’s law lands amid a surge of state-level AI chatbot regulation. According to the Transparency Coalition’s April 24 update, Tennessee’s CHAT Act (SB 1700) passed the Senate 31-0 and the House 90-0 in April, establishing similar chatbot safety requirements. Nebraska attached its own Conversational AI Safety Act (LB 1185) to an agricultural data privacy bill, passing 49-0 and signed into law by Governor Pillen on April 17. Hawaii has three AI bills in reconciliation, including HB 1782 establishing safeguards for AI companion interactions with minors.
Plural Policy tracked 19 new AI bills passed into law across U.S. states in April alone. For companies operating consumer-facing chatbots or AI agents, Idaho’s July 1 effective date creates the first compliance deadline in what is shaping up to be a patchwork of state-by-state chatbot regulation.