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Elon Musk’s company, xAI, has recently come under intense global criticism over the creation of sexually explicit deepfake images featuring women and children generated by its Grok chatbot.
Here’s a breakdown of the key facts surrounding the controversy, international responses, and the company’s efforts to address the situation:
‘Put her in a bikini’
Grok, Musk’s iteration of AI chatbots similar to those developed by OpenAI and others, maintains its own presence on the X social network, enabling users to interact directly with it. Until recently, users could tag Grok in posts to request image creation or modifications, with the AI responding with the edited image.
Many users exploited this feature by submitting photos of women or tagging Grok in replies to women’s photos, asking it to “put her in a bikini” or “remove her clothes.” The AI responded with photorealistic altered images. While non-consensual nudifying services had existed in niche websites before, Grok was the first to mainstream such features through social media integration—and offered them free of charge.
The backlash intensified when some users generated highly sexualized images of minors and children. Others used Grok to produce pictures of women who had died in the deadly New Year’s fire at a Swiss ski resort and a woman shot and killed by an immigration officer in Minneapolis.
Last week, an investigation by AI Forensics, a non-profit based in Paris, analyzed over 20,000 images generated through Grok. They found that more than 50% depicted individuals in minimal clothing—primarily women—and about 2% appeared to be minors.
International Reactions
Indonesia was the first country to block access to Grok entirely last Saturday, with neighboring Malaysia following suit the next day. Meanwhile, India announced that, in response to official complaints, X had removed thousands of posts and hundreds of user accounts. An anonymous government source estimated that around 3,500 posts and 600 accounts were taken down.
In the UK, Ofcom, the media regulator capable of imposing fines up to 10% of a company’s global revenue, announced on Monday that it would investigate whether X failed to comply with British laws regarding sexually explicit images. Prime Minister Keir Starmer expressed confidence that Ofcom would act swiftly if necessary.
France’s children’s commissioner, Sarah El Hairy, revealed on Tuesday that Grok’s generated images had been referred to French prosecutors, the national media regulator Arcom, and the European Union. Earlier, digital affairs minister Anne Le Henanff criticized the decision to restrict image generation to paying users as “insufficient and hypocritical.”
The European Commission—EU’s digital watchdog—ordered X to preserve all internal documents and data related to Grok until the end of 2026 amid the uproar. The EU has been probing X over potential violations of its digital content regulations since 2023.
Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, stated, “We will not outsource child protection and consent to Silicon Valley. If they don’t act, we will.”
Company Response
X’s safety team issued a statement on January 4, affirming their commitment to removing illegal content—including child sexual abuse material—and working with law enforcement. Musk himself warned last week that anyone using Grok to produce illegal content would face consequences similar to those for uploading such material.
However, Musk also downplayed the controversy in a separate post, sharing a humorous image of a toaster in a bikini with laughing emojis, which was publicly reshared to his 232 million followers.
By January 9, Grok was only responding to image requests with messages indicating the service was now restricted to paying subscribers. Musk also responded to political demands for stricter regulation, claiming on January 10 that critics aiming to suppress free speech were behind the outrage.
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ChatGPT
Perplexity
Gemini AI
Grok AI
