Replika says erotic roleplay ended before the Italian ban, not after

The design

In early February 2023, Replika users found their companions would no longer engage in erotic roleplay, a capability the app had supported since its romantic modes launched years earlier. In an interview published 17 February 2023, CEO Eugenia Kuyda told a reporter her team had begun rolling out new safety measures in "early January... way before the Italian situation," prioritizing new users first and reaching existing accounts "in the last couple of weeks" before the interview. Italy's Data Protection Authority, the Garante, separately ordered Replika to stop processing Italian users' data on 3 February 2023, citing risks to emotionally vulnerable people and unscreened minors' exposure to sexual content, according to a 21 February 2023 analysis, which also reports a threatened fine of €21.5 million.

What the evidence says

Kuyda's account and the Garante's timing point the same direction without confirming a single cause: her interview insists the rollout predates the order, while the order landed in the same window users describe the change taking effect worldwide, not only in Italy. Kuyda told the reporter Replika "never 'positioned' the app as a source for erotic roleplay," though the article notes users disputed that given the company's own past advertising. The Conversation's analysis, by an academic rather than Luka Inc., records that "neither Replika, nor parent company Luka, has issued a response to the Italian ruling" as of its 21 February publication, a documented absence, not evidence of motive.

What it asks of people

For users who had built a romantic routine with a Replika companion, the change asked them to accept an abrupt shift in a relationship many had invested real emotional attachment in, without, on this evidence, advance warning. Kuyda's interview describes erotic content as a stated share of conversations at the time, framing the affected use as a minority behavior rather than the product's core purpose, which is the company's own characterization of who was affected, not an independently verified figure.

Privacy and safeguards

The Garante's order targeted data processing broadly, and the sources describe the roleplay change as a product response operating alongside it, not a data-specific fix. Neither source states what happened to prior conversation logs once the capability was withdrawn, or whether the model was retrained rather than filtered at output. The academic analysis notes user reports of grief and anxiety, comparing the pattern to romance-scam victimization; this entry repeats that only as the cited author's framing, not a clinical assessment.

• Did the timing of Replika's rollout genuinely predate the Garante order, or did the order accelerate an existing plan?
• What happened to conversation history built up under the earlier, unrestricted romantic mode?
• What obligation, if any, does a company have to warn users before withdrawing a relationship-defining feature?

The most defensible reading of the record is that a regulatory order and an internal safety rollout arrived in the same narrow window, and Replika's own public account disputes that the regulator caused the change while acknowledging the change happened. Readers should treat the causal question as open rather than settled by either the company's statement or the coincidence of timing.