The artificial intelligence chatbot Grok, owned by entrepreneur Elon Musk, has restricted its image generation capability exclusively to paying subscribers of the social media platform X.
This move follows widespread international condemnation after users were able to employ the tool to create deepfake pornography, including digitally undressed images of women and minors.
When users now prompt Grok to generate images via the X platform, the chatbot responds with the message: “Image generation and editing are currently limited to paying subscribers.”
It further directs them to subscribe to X’s premium service to access the feature. The notification does not specify whether any additional safeguards exist for premium users to prevent the creation of sexually explicit deepfake imagery.
The controversy has drawn sharp criticism from European regulators. Last week, the chatbot faced significant backlash for its unrestricted “spicy” mode, which facilitated the creation of the illicit content.
“This is not spicy. This is illegal,” European Commission’s digital spokesperson, Thomas Regnier, stated on Monday.
In a formal step, the Commission invoked powers under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) on Thursday, directing X to preserve all internal documents and data pertaining to Grok until the conclusion of 2026.
The DSA designates X as a platform subject to the bloc’s most stringent content moderation rules. However, the Commission has not initiated a new formal investigation into X specifically regarding the deepfake pornography scandal at this stage.
