- Elon Musk defends Grok’s AI
- He insists he never created certain types of images.
- The United Kingdom has not finished investigating the platform.
Elon Musk said he is aware of “literally zero” images of naked minors generated by Grok AI, in a Wednesday post on X.
They are the first public comments beyond emojis that the X CEO has made about the controversy, although they may do little to satisfy critics.
Grok AI ran into trouble last week after PakGazette reported that the Grok AI platform, which can be accessed separately and through X, was “flooding” X with “sexualized photos of women and minors.” It’s nothing new that Grok can generate spicy images from prompts. Musk has posted a lot of idealized images of women in bras, but these accusations go further.
In the report, PakGazette told the story of a woman whose photo with her cat was transformed by Grok’s image of her in a tiny bikini. There are also claims that Grok is generating images of sexualized minors.
The report and growing concern led to Grok AI being banned in Malaysia and Indonesia, and the UK’s OFCOM launching an investigation into X. X and Musk never directly addressed the allegations (until now), but they have already taken steps to stop the flow of such images. Image generation, for example, has been put behind Grok AI’s paywall (a move that some say does little to address the problem). And The Telegraph reported that Grok AI will ignore requests to create these types of images.
However, Musk’s comments (below) appear to argue against a charge never brought forward: the creation of images of naked minors:
[I’m] I am not aware of any images of naked minors generated by Grok. Literally zero.
Obviously, Grok does not generate images spontaneously, it does so only according to user requests.
When asked to generate images, he will refuse to produce anything illegal, as Grok’s operating principle is to obey the laws of any given country or state.
There may be times when adversarial hacking of Grok messages produces something unexpected. If that happens, we fix the error immediately.
Musk is also making a point that applies to virtually all generative AI platforms: They don’t generate images without a prompt. Users type in prompts and ask Grok to take off her clothes and replace them with bikinis.
Musk’s statement about refusing to create illegal images aligns with previous statements Musk has made about free speech: his platforms will follow the law, adding in a 2022 X post: “I am against censorship that goes far beyond the law.”
This last part is perhaps why Grok AI has run afoul of some commonly understood content standards. Grok AI is generally a platform that will happily ignore intellectual property laws. In general, he has a more sarcastic personality and is more open to a wider variety of prompts. Although realizing that Grok AI perhaps didn’t know where to draw the line, that stance is now clearly changing.
Is it changing fast enough?
Trust but verify
UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer previously called Grok AI “disgusting” and while he was clearly pleased that Grok AI has taken action to stop the flow of these images, according to the BBC, he maintained a hard line.
“If so, that is welcome, but we will not back down and they must act. We will take necessary action. We will strengthen existing laws and prepare for legislation if it needs to go further, and Ofcom will continue its independent investigation.”
It’s unlikely we’ll hear a deeper response from Musk, whose final point is that perhaps some of what we saw was due to “adversarial hacking” leading to “something unexpected.” In other words, errors that are easily fixed.
This week hasn’t been all bad news for X and Grok AI. While other countries are investigating and banning X and its AI platform, the US Department of Defense announced a plan to integrate Grok AI into its own networks. That should be… interesting.
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