Eating dysfunction nonprofit pulls plug on AI chatbot for giving weight reduction recommendation

An AI chatbot that responded to folks with consuming problems was shut down by its nonprofit operators as a result of this system was telling folks how they may safely drop extra pounds.

The National Eating Disorders Association took its Tessa Chatbot offline Tuesday following social media posts that documented the factitious intelligence program’s weight reduction recommendation — reminiscent of telling customers particular caloric deficits to shoot for.

“With regard to the weight loss and calorie limiting feedback issued in a chat yesterday, we are concerned and are working with the technology team and the research team to investigate this further; that language is against our policies and core beliefs as an eating disorder organization,” Liz Thompson, CEO of NEDA, instructed Vice News in a press release. “So far, more than 2,500 people have interacted with Tessa, and until yesterday we hadn’t seen that kind of commentary or interaction. We’ve taken the program down temporarily until we can understand and fix the bug and triggers for that commentary.”

NEDA was elevating Tessa as its predominant level of contact for help line callers, because the nonprofit was dealing with a unionization effort by its staffers. The human operators had already been fired and Tessa was imagined to assume full management of the help line duties Thursday till its responses went public. 

The points had been first introduced up by Sharon Maxwell, a self-described fats activist who shared her complaints Monday on Instagram. 

Eating dysfunction psychologist Alexis Conason shared screenshots of her trade with Tessa on Instagram, getting the chatbot to provide the recommendation that’s been deemed problematic: