“What we have been seeing online in recent days has been absolutely appalling, and unacceptable in decent society.”
Elon Musk’s X has been slapped down by the technology secretary Liz Kendall, after thousands of “deepfakes” images sexualising women and children appeared on the platform over the new year period.
Grok AI, Musk’s artificial intelligence chatbot, is still being used to digitally undress and produce degrading images, predominantly of women and minors.
This is despite the social media platform having pledged to suspend users who generate them.
Yesterday, Kendall warned the world’s richest man that “the UK will not tolerate the endless proliferation of disgusting and abusive material online”.
The technology secretary added: “What we have been seeing online in recent days has been absolutely appalling, and unacceptable in decent society.
“No one should have to go through the ordeal of seeing intimate deepfakes of themselves online.”
She also called on X to “deal with this urgently”, and backed Ofcom to “take any enforcement action it deems necessary”.
Ofcom said it had made “urgent contact” with Musk’s company xAI on Monday about the illegal images.
Under the Online Safety Act, intimate image abuse and cyberflashing, including images generated by AI, are offences.
This means platforms must prevent such content from appearing online and act swiftly to remove it if it does.
Kendall added that the government has also legislated to ban the creation of explicit deepfakes without consent, which are both “degrading and harmful”.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
Left Foot Forward doesn’t have the backing of big business or billionaires. We rely on the kind and generous support of ordinary people like you.
You can support hard-hitting journalism that holds the right to account, provides a forum for debate among progressives, and covers the stories the rest of the media ignore. Donate today.
