FILE – Elon Musk listens as President Donald Trump speaks throughout a information convention within the Oval Workplace of the White Home, Could 30, 2025, in Washington.
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KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Malaysia and Indonesia have develop into the primary nations to dam Grok, the substitute intelligence chatbot developed by Elon Musk’s xAI, after authorities mentioned it was being misused to generate sexually specific and non-consensual pictures.
The strikes replicate rising international concern over generative AI instruments that may produce real looking pictures, sound and textual content, whereas current safeguards fail to forestall their abuse. The Grok chatbot, which is accessed by Musk’s social media platform X, has been criticized for producing manipulated pictures, together with depictions of girls in bikinis or sexually specific poses, in addition to pictures involving kids.
Regulators within the two Southeast Asian nations mentioned current controls weren’t stopping the creation and unfold of faux pornographic content material, significantly involving ladies and minors. Indonesia’s authorities quickly blocked entry to Grok on Saturday, adopted by Malaysia on Sunday.
“The federal government sees non-consensual sexual deepfakes as a severe violation of human rights, dignity and the protection of residents within the digital house,” Indonesia’s Communication and Digital Affairs Minister Meutya Hafid mentioned in a press release Saturday.
The ministry mentioned the measure was supposed to guard ladies, kids and the broader neighborhood from pretend pornographic content material generated utilizing AI.
Preliminary findings confirmed that Grok lacks efficient safeguards to cease customers from creating and distributing pornographic content material primarily based on actual images of Indonesian residents, Alexander Sabar, director basic of digital house supervision, mentioned in a separate assertion. He mentioned such practices danger violating privateness and picture rights when images are manipulated or shared with out consent, inflicting psychological, social and reputational hurt.
In Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Fee ordered a short lived restriction on Grok on Sunday after what it mentioned was “repeated misuse” of the device to generate obscene, sexually specific and non-consensual manipulated pictures, together with content material involving ladies and minors.
The regulator mentioned notices issued this month to X Corp. and xAI demanding stronger safeguards drew responses that relied primarily on consumer reporting mechanisms.
“The restriction is imposed as a preventive and proportionate measure whereas authorized and regulatory processes are ongoing,” it mentioned, including that entry will stay blocked till efficient safeguards are put in place.
Launched in 2023, Grok is free to make use of on X. Customers can ask it questions on the social media platform and tag posts they’ve straight created or replies to posts from different customers. Final summer season the corporate added a picture generator function, Grok Think about, that included a so-called “spicy mode” that may generate grownup content material.
The Southeast Asian restrictions come amid mounting scrutiny of Grok elsewhere, together with within the European Union, Britain, India and France. Grok final week restricted picture technology and modifying to paying customers following a worldwide backlash over sexualized deepfakes of individuals, however critics say it didn’t absolutely handle the issue.
