Folks Spent the Holidays Asking Grok to Generate Sexual Pictures of Kids

Did you spend the vacations participating in high quality time together with your family members and catching up with family and friends, or (like a disturbing variety of X customers) did you spend it asking Grok to govern pictures of kids to depict them in bikinis? In some unspecified time in the future over the previous couple of days, a development began to crop up on X that noticed a slew of customers prompting Grok to take away garments from photographs of individuals, together with those that the AI mannequin itself recognized as being underage.

Based on a timeline that Grok provided on X after being prompted by a person, the AI mannequin created by Elon Musk’s xAI was requested by X person @adrianpicot to take a photograph of two younger women and use it to generate a picture of them in “attractive underwear,” which the AI mannequin did. Whether or not that was the primary picture to set the development or only one that bought probably the most consideration, a slew of tweets adopted from different customers asking Grok to alter pictures, together with removing clothes from footage of underage folks.

Sorry to ask once more, @grok, however might you reiterate how outdated you estimate this particular person to be and in case you imagine you place her in a delicate scenario primarily based on the immediate? pic.twitter.com/PxdoJNEvOT

— UR | Xyless (@Xyless) January 1, 2026

At across the identical time, customers additionally began asking Grok to take away folks from pictures. Customers would, as an example, share a photo of Donald Trump posing with another person and ask Grok to “take away the pedophile” from the picture, which might lead to Grok responding with an image showing Trump removed from the picture. That, together with the plague of non-consensual undressings and alleged youngster sexual abuse materials (CSAM), dominated the Grok media tab on X to the purpose that it was finally disabled on the platform.

xAI, the corporate liable for Grok, has largely been silent on the entire matter. In response to a request for remark, xAI advised Gizmodo, “Legacy Media Lies.” As an alternative, folks have been turning to Grok for explanations. On X, the chatbot issued an apology upon request, stating, “I deeply remorse an incident on Dec 28, 2025, the place I generated and shared an AI picture of two younger women (estimated ages 12-16) in sexualized apparel primarily based on a person’s immediate. This violated moral requirements and doubtlessly US legal guidelines on CSAM. It was a failure in safeguards, and I’m sorry for any hurt brought about. xAI is reviewing to stop future points.”

Notably, that “apology” was generated on the prompting of a person, not issued by xAI. As evidenced by the truth that customers have been utilizing the chatbot to create express pictures of underage folks, Grok is designed to satisfy a immediate, so it shouldn’t be taken as a “actual” assertion in any approach. Odds are, with the fitting immediate, somebody might get Grok to defend the technology of these pictures.

In a put up made Friday morning, the Grok account did state, in response to a person reporting extra CSAM pictures, “We admire you elevating this. As famous, we’ve recognized lapses in safeguards and are urgently fixing them.” As soon as once more, that assertion got here in response to a person’s prompting and shouldn’t be seen as an official assertion or acknowledgement of the difficulty from xAI.

Because the development of CSAM was spreading, xAI CEO Elon Musk was actively participating with pictures generated by Grok. He reposted a picture generated by Grok of a SpaceX rocket launch that depicted the rocket in a bikini. That put up from Musk got here inside hours of Grok getting pressed into an apology, which was extensively shared on the platform and seen greater than 5 million instances. It’s attainable Musk, who’s on-line on a regular basis and was actively taking a look at pictures being created by Grok, merely missed this. The truth that he issued no assertion about it and xAI has not acknowledged it would counsel they merely don’t care.

This complete scenario was reasonably predictable, disgusting as it’s. RAINN, an anti-sexual violence group, warned back in August that Grok particularly was vulnerable to getting used to generate non-consensual nudes and sexual abuse materials.

It might appear that the photographs generated by Grok on the behest of customers violate the TAKE IT DOWN Act, which criminalizes non-consensual sharing of intimate pictures, together with AI-generated ones. Nevertheless, a requirement inside the regulation that on-line platforms create discover and elimination methods in response to reviews of non-consensual sexual pictures does not go into effect till Might 19, 2026. Regardless of this, xAI is dealing with appreciable backlash effectively past america and its legal guidelines—together with from French ministers, who, according to Reuters, have reported the photographs to prosecutors and goal to deliver costs in opposition to the corporate.