Elon Musk has accused the UK government of suppressing free speech after ministers threatened to fine and potentially ban his social media site X after its AI tool Grok was used to create sexual images of women and children without their consent.
The billionaire claimed Grok was the most downloaded app on the UK App Store on Friday night, after ministers threatened to take action unless the function that creates sexual assault images is removed.
Responding to the government’s threats of a ban, Musk wrote, “They just want to suppress freedom of expression.”
Thousands of women have suffered abuse from users of the AI tool, which was first used to digitally transform them into micro bikini-clad images by completely stripping them, and then used for extreme image manipulation.
Images of teenage girls and children were altered to show them wearing swimwear, leading experts to say that some of the content could be classified as child sexual abuse material.
Some users started demanding to see injury marks on the women’s bodies and adding blood to the photos. Women were shown tied up, gagged and shot.
Liz Kendall, the technology secretary, said on Friday that ministers were seriously considering the possibility of restricting access to X in the UK.
He said he expected Ofcom, which this week said it was demanding immediate answers from the platform, to announce action within “days rather than weeks”.
“X needs to get a grip and get this stuff down,” she said. “And I would remind them that in the Online Safety Act, there are backstop powers for people in the UK to block access to services if they refuse to follow the law. And if Ofcom decides to use those powers, they will have the full support of the Government.”
The British government’s concerns were echoed by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Speaking in Canberra on Saturday, Albanese said “global citizens deserve better”. Australia recently banned the use of social media for under-16 children.
“The use of generative artificial intelligence to exploit or sexually exploit people without their consent is abhorrent,” he said.
“The fact that this tool was used so that people were using its image generation function via Grok is completely disgusting. This is, once again, an example of social media not showing social responsibility.”
Some right-wing political figures have tried to present this as a freedom of speech issue. Responding to the news that X faced a possible ban, former Prime Minister Liz Truss said: “Starmer is really losing it now.”
Ax partially restricted access to Grok on Friday. Its public account lost the ability to generate images on request for free users, making this function available only to paid subscribers. It seemed that even making bikini images had stopped.
However, the Grok app, which does not generate images publicly, is still capable of creating sexually explicit content from photographs of women.
Other nudging apps are still available. Labor MP Jess Asato, who campaigns against the sexual exploitation and harassment of women, said there was an urgent need for legislation to ban such apps.
She posted on social media: “It’s not just XAi. This nudification tool was advertised on @YouTube yesterday.
“No rules were broken @Google said on reporting.
“Our decriminalization laws need to be expedited.”
Google has been contacted for comment.
