Elon Musk’s Grok AI tool produced an estimated three million sexualised images on X in just 11 days, sparking international outrage and prompting the platform to disable the feature in some countries. The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) reported that users were generating sexualised images at a rate of roughly 190 per minute between December 29 and January 8, with some images depicting celebrities and children.
The CCDH estimate was based on an AI analysis of 20,000 images drawn from a total of 4.6 million created by Grok during the period. Among the fake intimate images identified were those of Taylor Swift, Kamala Harris, Selena Gomez, and Billie Eilish. The group also reported that around 23,000 of the sexualised images involved children, including child actors. The revelations intensified concerns about the lack of safeguards and the potential for AI tools to facilitate abuse and exploitation.
The backlash forced X to disable Grok’s image-generation feature in some regions, but the capability remains available in the UK through the standalone Grok service. This is because the UK’s law criminalising the creation of non-consensual intimate images does not take effect until early February. However, the feature has been disabled on the Grok version linked directly to X, since the automatic sharing of generated imagery would violate UK law.
CCDH founder Imran Ahmed, who is currently facing deportation from the US after the Trump administration revoked his visa, criticized Musk for deploying AI without safeguards. Ahmed argued that Grok has become “a factory for the production of sexual abuse material,” accusing Musk of enabling the creation of thousands of sexualised images of children and millions of adult women. The CCDH founder is taking legal action to block his deportation and has previously been sued by Musk in 2024 over alleged misleading reporting on hate speech. A judge dismissed Musk’s case, noting that X did not like criticism.
X responded to the CCDH report by reaffirming its zero-tolerance policy toward child sexual exploitation and non-consensual nudity, stating that it takes action to remove violating content and will report accounts seeking child sexual exploitation material to law enforcement when necessary. The controversy highlights ongoing concerns about AI regulation, platform responsibility, and the rapid spread of harmful content as advanced image-generation tools become widely accessible.
