LONDON, Jan 6 — The European Commission said on Monday that images of undressed women and children being shared across Elon Musk’s social media site X are unlawful and appalling, joining a growing chorus of officials across the world who have condemned the surge in nonconsensual imagery on the platform.
The condemnation follows reporting, including from Reuters, that X’s built-in artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot Grok is unleashing a flood of on-demand images of women and minors in extremely skimpy clothing — a functionality X has in the past referred to as “spicy mode”.
The European Commission said it is “very aware” of the fact that X was offering a “spicy mode”, spokesperson Thomas Regnier told reporters.
“This is not ‘spicy’. This is illegal. This is appalling. This is disgusting. This is how we see it, and this has no place in Europe,” he said.
In Britain, regulator Ofcom yesterday demanded X explain how Grok is able to produce undressed images of people and sexualised images of children, and whether it is failing in its legal duty to protect users.
X did not immediately return a message seeking comment on the European Commission’s or Ofcom’s statements. In its last message to Reuters on the matter, X said “Legacy Media Lies”.
Online, Musk has shrugged off the concerns over Grok’s undressing spree, posting laughing-so-hard-I’m-crying emojis in response to public figures edited to look like they were in bikinis.
Ofcom said it is aware of “serious concerns” raised about the feature. “We have made urgent contact with X and xAI to understand what steps they have taken to comply with their legal duties to protect users in the UK,” a spokesperson said.
Creating or sharing non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material, including AI-generated hyper-realistic sexual imagery, is illegal in Britain. In addition, tech platforms have a duty to take steps to stop British users encountering illegal content and take it down when they become aware of it.
The statements from EU and British officials come after ministers in France reported X to prosecutors and regulators over the disturbing images, saying in a statement on January 2 that the “sexual and sexist” content is “manifestly illegal”. Indian officials have also demanded explanations from X over what they called obscene content.
Even as officials in Europe and Asia demanded answers over Grok’s production of nonconsensual images, the US government, which is led by Musk ally Donald Trump, has yet to address the issue. Messages seeking comment from the Federal Communications Commission were not returned. The Federal Trade Commission declined to comment. The Justice Department did not immediately return an email.
