Elon Musk has said that critics of his social media site X are looking for “any excuse for censorship”, amid reports that X’s artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot Grok was creating non-consensual sexualised images of people, including children.
Ofcom says it is conducting an urgent assessment of X in response, which has been backed by Technology Secretary Liz Kendall.
She described the sexual manipulation of images of women and children as “despicable and abhorrent”, adding that she would expect to see an update from Ofcom in “days”.
X has now limited the use of AI image function to those who pay a monthly fee, a change dubbed by Downing Street as “insulting” to victims of sexual violence.
The has seen several examples of the free AI tool undressing women and putting them in sexual situations without their consent.
Ashley St Clair, the mother of one of Elon Musk’s children, told Newshour that Grok had generated sexualised photos of her as a child.
The conservative influencer said her image had been “stripped” to appear “basically nude, bent over”, despite her telling Grok that she did not consent to the sexualised images.
St Clair, who filed a lawsuit against Musk last year seeking sole custody of their child, accused the social media site of “not taking enough action” to tackle illegal content, including child sexual abuse imagery. “This could be stopped with a singular message to an engineer,” she said.
As of Friday morning, Grok was telling users asking it to alter images uploaded to X that “image generation and editing are currently limited to paying subscribers”, adding users “can subscribe to unlock these features”.
An Ofcom spokesperson said: “We urgently made contact [with X] on Monday and set a firm deadline of today [Friday] to explain themselves, to which we have received a response.”
“We’re now undertaking an expedited assessment as a matter of urgency and will provide further updates shortly.”
Ofcom’s powers under the Online Safety Act include being able to seek a court order to prevent third parties from helping X raise money or be accessed in the UK – should the firm refuse to comply.
Kendall has said that Ofcom will have the government’s full support if it makes the decision to block X in the UK.
The use of Grok to generate non-consensual sexualised images has been condemned by politicians on all sides:
- Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer calling it “disgraceful” and “disgusting”
- Reform UK leader Nigel Farage said it was “horrible in every way” and that X “needs to go further” than the changes it had made to Grok on Friday, but he added that banning the platform would be an attack on free speech
- The Liberal Democrats called for access to X to be temporarily restricted in the UK while the social media site was investigated.
