X acts on obscene Grok content after govt notice

MIcroblogging political program X removed almost 3,500 pieces of contents and deleted o'er 600 accounts after the accompany accepted its mistake in handling objectionable content generated by its AI chatbot Grok and committed to complying with Indian law, officials aware of the matter said on Sunday.The development came roughly a week after the ministry of electronics and information technology (Meity) first raised concerns over obscene and sexually explicit content linked to the chatbot. India’s move was part of a widening international crackdown that has already seen Indonesia order a suspension of access to Grok and investigations by the European Union and UK.“X has accepted its mistake. The company said it will operate as per India’s laws... Going forward, X will not allow obscene imagery,” said a Hindi communication shared by the officials cited above.There was no official comment on the issue by either MeitY or X. HT’s request for more details on the action taken by X or the period during which this action was taken didn’t elicit a response from MeitY.The AI chatbot Grok, developed by Musk’s xAI and integrated into X, has come under intense global scrutiny after users used its image-generation and editing capabilities to create and share non-consensual, sexualised deepfake images of real people, including women and minors. These images, often depicting undressed or sexually suggestive content, spread widely on X and alarmed regulators and rights groups. Governments in Europe, Asia and beyond have criticised the tool’s safeguards and opened inquiries, while X has partly restricted the feature to paying users amid widespread backlash.Meity wrote to X on January 2, flagging what it called serious failures in preventing obscene and sexually explicit content generated using Grok. The ministry warned that continued non-compliance could strip X of legal protection under Indian law. X requested an extension, citing two intervening holidays — for Christmas and New Year’s Day — as the reason it needed additional time.In the two days leading up to the January 2 letter, Meity had held discussions with X’s compliance teams over Grok’s responses to political and religious issues, HT reported on January 3. The deadline for the response was 5pm on January 7.The fresh details of content removal were shared with MeitY after the government conveyed its dissatisfaction with X’s response on January 7, which officials said failed to provide specific information and largely reiterated the company’s existing user policies. This clarification was sought after the ministry found X’s initial response to its January 2 notice inadequate. The ministry subsequently sought a detailed report outlining concrete action taken against offending content and users.Officials cited above also underlined the government’s position that Grok will be treated as a content creator rather than merely a platform tool, a classification that could have implications for intermediary liability. MeitY had told X that safe harbour protection under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act applies only if due diligence obligations are strictly followed.In its letter, addressed to X’s chief compliance officer Vinay Prakash, Meity said, “It has especially been observed that the service namely ‘Grok AI’... Is being misused by users to create fake accounts to host, generate, publish or share obscene images or videos of women in a derogatory or vulgar manner in order to indecently denigrate them.”The abuse is not limited to fake accounts, the ministry noted. It also targets women who upload their own photos or videos, which are then manipulated through AI prompts and synthetic outputs.The MeitY letter cited multiple legal violations, including sections of the IT Act dealing with obscene content, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act, 1986, and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act, 2012.The ministry specifically directed X to immediately undertake a comprehensive review of Grok’s “prompt-processing, output-generation (responses generated using Large Language Models), image-handling and safety guardrails” to ensure the application does not generate, promote or facilitate content containing “nudity, sexualisation, sexually explicit or otherwise unlawful content”.X must also enforce its user terms of service with “strong deterrent measures such as suspension, termination and other enforcement actions against violating users and accounts”, and remove all violating content without delay, the notice said.The issue drew political attention as well. Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Priyanka Chaturvedi accused X of “monetising harmful behaviour” after the platform restricted Grok’s image-generation feature to paid users amid global backlash.MeitY officials told HT the ministry will continue to closely monitor compliance by X and other platforms, warning that any recurrence of violations could invite further action under Indian law.Under the IT Act, intermediaries like X enjoy safe harbour protections from liability for user-generated content, but these protections are conditional upon strict observance of due diligence obligations.The controversy also highlighted broader challenges facing AI image generation tools. The Internet Watch Foundation, a non-profit that identifies child sexual abuse material online, reported a 400% increase in AI-generated child abuse imagery in the first six months of 2025, Bloomberg reported.xAI has positioned Grok as more permissive than other mainstream AI models and last summer introduced a feature called “Spicy Mode” that permits partial adult nudity and sexually suggestive content. The service prohibits pornography involving real people’s likenesses and sexual content involving minors, which is illegal to create or distribute.