Article via https://www.vice.com on 30 May 2023
The National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA) has taken its chatbot called Tessa offline, two days before it was set to replace human associates who ran the organization’s hotline.
As of Tuesday, Tessa was taken down by the organization following a viral social media post displaying how the chatbot encouraged unhealthy eating habits rather than helping someone with an eating disorder.
“It came to our attention last night that the current version of the Tessa Chatbot, running the Body Positive program, may have given information that was harmful and unrelated to the program,” NEDA said in an Instagram post.
“Every single thing Tessa suggested were things that led to the development of my eating disorder,” Maxwell wrote.
A day later, NEDA posted its notice explaining that Tessa was taken offline due to giving harmful responses.