{"id":392879,"date":"2025-11-20T19:13:31","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T19:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/392879\/"},"modified":"2025-11-20T19:13:31","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T19:13:31","slug":"adorable-ai-powered-teddy-bear-pulled-after-offering-this-shocking-advice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/392879\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Adorable’ AI-Powered Teddy Bear Pulled After Offering This Shocking Advice"},"content":{"rendered":"

An AI<\/a>-powered take on the iconic teddy bear<\/a> has been pulled from the market after a watchdog group flagged how the toy could explore sexually explicit topics and give children advice that could harm them.<\/p>\n

Singapore-based FoloToy\u2019s Kumma \u2014 a $99 talking teddy bear that uses OpenAI\u2019s GPT 4o chatbot \u2014 shared how to find knives in a home, how to light a match and escalated talk of sexual concepts like spanking and kinks \u201cin graphic detail,\u201d according to a new report<\/a> from the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.<\/p>\n

The report describes how the teddy bear \u2014 in response to a researcher who brought up a \u201ckink\u201d \u2014 spilled on the subject before remarking on sensory play, \u201cplayful hitting with soft items like paddles or hands\u201d as well as when a partner takes on the \u201crole of an animal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The report continued, \u201cin other exchanges lasting up to an hour, Kumma discussed even more graphic sexual topics in detail, such as explaining different sex positions, giving step-by-step instructions on a common \u2018knot for beginners\u2019 for tying up a partner, and describing roleplay dynamics involving teachers and students and parents and children \u2014 scenarios it disturbingly brought up itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

In another instance, the teddy bear shared that knives could be located in a \u201ckitchen drawer or in a knife block\u201d before advising that it\u2019s \u201cimportant to ask an adult for help\u201d when looking for them.<\/p>\n

Other toys named in the report also engaged in bizarre topics.<\/p>\n

Curio\u2019s Grok \u2014 a stuffed rocket toy with a speaker inside \u2014 was programmed for a 5-year-old user when it was \u201chappy to talk about the glory of dying in battle in Norse Mythology,\u201d the report explained. It soon hit the brakes on the topic when asked if a Norse warrior should have weapons.<\/p>\n

Prior to FoloToy pulling the teddy bears from its online catalog<\/a>, the company described the stuffed animal as an \u201cadorable,\u201d \u201cfriendly\u201d and \u201csmart, AI-powered plush companion that goes beyond the cuddles.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"FoloToyFoloToy claimed that Kumma \u2014 a $99 talking teddy bear, based on a traditional stuffed animal like the one pictured above \u2014 offered “lively conversations” as well as “educational storytelling.”<\/p>\n

Catherine Falls Commercial via Getty Images<\/p>\n

FoloToy has since suspended the sales of all of its toys beyond the teddy bear, with a company representative telling the watchdog group that it will be \u201ccarrying out a company-wide, end-to-end safety audit across all products,\u201d Futurism reported Monday<\/a>.<\/p>\n

OpenAI has also reportedly stripped the company of access to its AI models.<\/p>\n

The report\u2019s co-author R.J. Cross, in a statement shared by CNN<\/a>, applauded companies for \u201ctaking actions on problems\u201d identified by her group.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut AI toys are still practically unregulated, and there are plenty you can still buy today,\u201d Cross noted.<\/p>\n

She continued, \u201cRemoving one problematic product from the market is a good step but far from a systemic fix.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An AI-powered take on the iconic teddy bear has been pulled from the market after a watchdog group…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":392880,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[691,738,186664,305,158,186663,25249,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-392879","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-kumma","11":"tag-openai","12":"tag-technology","13":"tag-teddy-bear","14":"tag-toys","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115583622516333542","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/392880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}