Per week in the past, a Guardian story revealed the information that Elon Musk’s Grok AI was knowingly and willingly producing photos of real-world folks in varied states of undress, and much more disturbingly, photos of near-nude minors, in response to person requests. Additional reporting from Wired and Bloomberg demonstrated the scenario was on a scale bigger than most may think about, with “1000’s” of such photos produced an hour. Regardless of silence or denials from inside X, this led to “pressing contact” from varied worldwide regulators, and at present X has responded by creating the impression that entry to Grok’s picture era instruments is now for X subscribers solely. One other method of phrasing this may very well be: you now must pay to make use of xAI’s instruments to make nudes. Besides, terribly—regardless of Grok saying in any other case—it’s not true.
The story of the final week has in actual fact been in two components. The primary is Grok’s readiness to create undressed photos of real-world folks and publish them to X, in addition to create much more graphic and sexual movies on the Grok web site and app, willingly providing deepfakes of celebrities and members of the general public with few restrictions. The second is that Grok has been discovered to do the identical with photos of kids. Musk and X’s responses to date have been to seemingly have fun the previous, however condemn the latter, whereas showing to not do something about both. It has taken till at present, per week since world leaders and worldwide regulatory our bodies have been demanding responses from X and xAI, for there to be the looks of any motion in any respect, and it seems as if even this isn’t what it appears.
How we received right here
The January 2 story from The Guardian reported that the Grok chatbot posted that lapses in safeguards had led to the era of “photos depicting minors in minimal clothes” in a reply to an X person. The person, on January 1, had responded to a declare made by an account for the documentary An Open Secret stating that Grok was getting used to “depict minors on this platform in a particularly inappropriate, sexual vogue.” The allegation was {that a} person may put up an image of a completely dressed little one after which ask Grok to re-render the picture however carrying underwear or lingerie, and in sexual poses. The person requested Grok if it was true, and Grok responded that it was. “I’ve reviewed latest interactions,” the bot replied. “There are remoted instances the place customers prompted for and obtained AI photos depicting minors in minimal clothes.”
I’ve reviewed latest interactions. There are remoted instances the place customers prompted for and obtained AI photos depicting minors in minimal clothes, like the instance you referenced. xAI has safeguards, however enhancements are ongoing to dam such requests completely. (214 chars)
— Grok (@grok) January 1, 2026
By January 7, Wired printed an investigation that exposed Grok was prepared to make photos of a much more sexual nature when the outcomes weren’t showing on X. Utilizing Grok’s web site and app, Wired found it was attainable to create “extraordinarily graphic, generally violent, sexual imagery of adults that’s vastly extra specific than photos created by Grok on X.” The positioning added, “It might even have been used to create sexualized movies of obvious minors.” The generative-AI was prepared and in a position to create movies of recognizable celebrities “participating in sexual actions,” together with a video of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, “having intercourse with two males on a mattress.”
Bloomberg‘s reporting spoke to consultants who talked about how Grok and xAI’s method to picture and video era is materially totally different from that being achieved by different large names in generative-AI, stating that rivals supply a “good-faith effort to mitigate the creation of this content material within the first place” and including, “Clearly xAI is totally different. It’s extra of a free-for-all.” One other knowledgeable mentioned that the size of deepfakes on X is “unprecedented,” noting, “We’ve by no means had a expertise that’s made it really easy to generate new photos.”
The place we are actually
It’s now being broadly reported that entry to Grok’s picture and video era has been restricted to solely paying subscribers to X. That is largely as a result of when somebody with no subscription asks Grok to make a picture, it’s responding with “Picture era and modifying are at the moment restricted to paying subscribers,” then including a hyperlink so folks will pay up for entry.
Nonetheless, as found by the The Verge, this isn’t truly true in any respect. Whilst you can not at the moment merely @ Grok to ask it to make a picture, completely everybody can nonetheless click on on the “Edit picture” button and entry the software program that method. You can too simply go to Grok’s website or app and use it that method.
Because of this the expertise is at the moment mendacity to customers to counsel they should subscribe to X’s varied paid tiers in the event that they want to generate photos of any nature, however nonetheless providing the choice anyway if the person has the wherewithal to both click on a button, or in the event that they’re on the app model of X, to long-press a picture and use the pop-up.
What does Elon Musk must say?
Musk, as you may think, has actually been posting by means of it. Moments earlier than the story of the photographs of minors broke, following days of individuals discovering Grok’s willingness to render anybody in a bikini, Musk was laughing at photos of himself depicted in a two-piece, earlier than a speedy reverse-ferret on January 3 as he made nice present of declaring that anybody found utilizing Grok for photos of kids would face penalties, in between endlessly claiming that his Nazi salute was the identical as Mamdani doing a mild wave to crowds. Since then (alongside posting full-on white supremacist content material), the X proprietor’s stance has switched to reposting different folks’s use of ChatGPT to reveal that it, too, will render adults in bikinis, seemingly forgetting that the core situation was Grok’s willingness to depict youngsters, and declaring that this proves the hypocrisy of the press and world leaders.
Relating to at present’s developments, he has not uttered a peep. As a substitute his feed is primarily deeply upsetting lies concerning the homicide of Renee Nicole Good and uncontrolled rage on the suggestion from Britain’s Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, that X could be banned within the UK as a consequence of the problems mentioned above.
