Since Elon Musk acquired Twitter in 2023 and rebranded it to X, we’ve seen a rise in misinformation, hate speech, incitement of violence, and most recently, AI-generated pornographic content being created and shared in just a few clicks. But will Grok’s sexual image generation be the nail in the coffin for Musk’s 44-billion-dollar social media platform?
According to the Centre for Countering Digital Hate, Grok has so far generated an estimated 3 million sexualised images, with 23,000 of those including children. This feature of Grok’s only rose to popularity in the last week of 2025. Images created include photorealistic depictions of individuals wearing only bikinis or transparent tape, tied up and bruised, and covered in white fluid. The images have targeted various celebrities and non-celebrities, including singers, actors, politicians, healthcare workers, and children. A review by Reuters of public requests sent to Grok over a single 10-minute-long period found 102 user attempts to use Grok to digitally alter images of people so that they were wearing only a bikini. They also found that the majority of these requests were made on images of women.
The reason Grok in particular is facing this response, despite other generative AI platforms having similar capabilities, is its ability to instantly share generated responses to X. Users can ask Grok to perform a sexual edit on any image via its comments, and the edit will appear under the post for anyone to see. In a sense, it removes the ‘middleman’ in the sharing of sexual content. As opposed to a situation where one might use generative AI to create an unsolicited photo, download it to their phone, then share it to social media, Grok appears to absolve some of the responsibility and illegality of this. Despite this, X users generating sexual images via Grok commit the same violation and may face the same consequences.
In a statement to parliament on the 12th of January, Liz Kendall MP, Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, called these AI-generated images “weapons of abuse, disproportionally aimed at women and girls”. She emphasised that sharing such images is a criminal offence and also confirmed the opening of a formal investigation into X by Ofcom. Depending on the outcome of the investigation, Ofcom could issue a fine of up to 10% of X’s revenue or even apply for a court order to stop UK users from accessing the site. Despite Kendall’s powerful statement, the UK government has not removed its presence from the platform following calls to do so.
Since the rise of Grok-generated sexual content at the end of December, Elon Musk has responded with new measures to prevent this from happening. On the 9th of January, the feature was restricted to paid users, but this only tackled the sheer number of images being created, not the issue of the image generation itself. In her address to Parliament, Kendall pointed out that “it is insulting to victims to say you can still have this service if you are willing to pay” and described the amendment as “monetising abuse”. On the 14th of January, further technical restrictions were added to the chatbot to prevent it from undressing images. However, it might be too little, too late for Musk, who responded to many of the early AI-generated images with cry-laugh emojis.
This is the latest controversy for Elon Musk, the wealthiest person in the world, following years of X-related backlash and a lengthy, complex relationship with US President Donald Trump. Since his acquisition of Twitter, the platform has seen a decrease in content moderation, leading to a rise in hate speech and misinformation. Musk has been a fierce advocate for free speech which has led to some of X’s scrutiny, yet a report by The Verge showed that Grok had been trained to ignore sources that suggested Musk had spread misinformation.
It was misinformation spread on X, peddled by Musk himself, that led to a rise in Islamophobic narratives and abuse following the 2024 Southport attack. Posts about the perpetrator’s ethnicity, religion and immigration status were spread rapidly without indication of being true and consequently led to a wave of inflammatory remarks being made towards certain groups of people. Much of this rhetoric was led by Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, commonly known as Tommy Robinson, a far-right activist whose account was reinstated by Musk after being banned from Twitter for hate speech.
Grok itself is not new to criticism. The AI chatbot offers a companion setting, such as ‘Ani’, who will use flirty, affectionate language, accompanied by a visual form. Ani has been called creepy by users despite being a popular feature, and highlights some of the issues around the growing parasocial relationships towards AI chatbots.
Even before Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, the platform was facing issues. In 2021, Twitter came under fire for playing a role in the January 6th storming of The Capitol. On the platform, Donald Trump was able to spread misinformation and conspiracy about the 2020 election without consequence. His incitement of violence was catalysed by his huge social media presence, and the riots that ensued led to several arrests, injuries, and fatalities.
X has certainly faced its fair share of controversies, but has the time come to really let it go or does it just require some more stringent rules? It seems that as long as it remains under the ownership of Elon Musk, the platform will remain a bastion for misinformation, where certain ideologies are given space to thrive whilst others are silenced. This isn’t necessarily grounds for the government or Ofcom to enforce a blanket ban. However, the recent rise in AI-generated sexual content is ultimately violative and illegal.
The UK government seems to back a ban should Ofcom deem it necessary, with Prime Minister Keir Starmer denouncing the platform, calling Grok’s content “disgusting” and stating that “free speech is not the freedom to violate consent”. Nonetheless, the UK Government are yet to step down from using the platform, something that could change soon with increasing pressure. Repeated attempts have been made to recreate X’s format, with applications such as Threads and Bluesky offering similar user interface with less involved and politically biased management. However, X remains an extremely popular platform. Ofcom’s pending investigation could certainly force some more stringent rules upon X or even force it off UK phones. And whilst it is unlikely that, in the age of VPNs and digital loopholes, we would really see the end of X in the UK, the recent controversy surrounding Grok just might be the thing that pushes people away from using X and onto other platforms instead.