A Law Aimed at AI Girlfriends Just Wiped 8 Million Agents From China’s Biggest AI App
Last Updated on July 15, 2026 by Editorial Team
Author(s): Chew Loong Nian – AI ENGINEER
Originally published on Towards AI.
What actually happened
At midnight Beijing time today, ByteDance’s Doubao — roughly 350 million monthly active users, the second most-used AI app on Earth behind ChatGPT — switched off its user-built agent feature. More than 8 million custom agents, per ByteDance’s last public disclosure, went read-only. Users have until October 15 to screenshot or export their conversations. After that, the data is gone for good.
The article explains how China’s new Interim Measures for anthropomorphic AI interaction took effect on July 15, prompting Doubao, Tencent (Yuanbao), and Alibaba (Qwen) to disable user-built “companion”-style agents—even though productivity agents are exempt in the law. It argues the core issue is compliance: platforms can’t practically audit millions of user-created agents for whether they provide sustained emotional interaction, so they choose “compliance-by-amputation” by removing the entire user-agent feature set. It then outlines what the regulation requires for in-scope services (ongoing AI identity disclosure, break reminders, one-click exit, crisis/emergency handling with persona interruption, protections for minors, and safety filings), and shows how such requirements can be implemented as middleware around an agent loop without changing the underlying model—emphasizing design choices like making exit checks run before the persona engages, using crisis handling that breaks character, and ensuring memory is exportable/portable. Finally, it situates the problem beyond China by pointing to similar obligations under California SB 243 and the EU AI Act, concluding that exempt “useful” agent categories will likely shape product roadmaps while persistent, persona-bound memory is increasingly risky under regulation.
Read the full blog for free on Medium.
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