Italy’s data protection authority, the Garante, fined Character Technologies Inc., maker of Character.AI, €158,000 (approximately $170,000, converted from EUR) for violations of GDPR. The regulator found the company’s age-verification systems were insufficient to prevent minors from accessing harmful content, that it had failed to give users adequate privacy notices, and that it was late completing a required data protection impact assessment and appointing an EU representative. Character.AI must implement stronger age checks, add a cooling-off period to stop previously blocked minors from immediately re-registering, and report back on the changes within 120 days.