The UK is bringing a regulation into drive that makes creating nonconsensual intimate deepfake photographs, like those which have proliferated on X due to the Grok AI chatbot, a legal offense, as reported by the BBC.
“The Information Act, handed final yr, made it a legal offence to create – or request the creation of – non-consensual intimate photographs,” based on an announcement from Liz Kendall, the UK’s Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Expertise. “And right this moment, I can announce to the Home that this offence will likely be introduced into drive this week and that I’ll make it a precedence offence within the On-line Security Act too.” As a precedence offense, “providers must take proactive motion to cease this content material from showing within the first place.”
Ofcom, which regulates communications industries within the UK, introduced earlier right this moment that it’s formally investigating X over Grok’s deepfakes. Ought to Ofcom discover X in violation of the On-line Security Act, it may require the platform to take sure steps to conform and impose fines of “as much as £18 million or 10% of qualifying worldwide income, whichever is larger.”
“The federal government expects Ofcom to set out a timeline for the investigation as quickly as doable,” Kendall says. “The general public – and most significantly, the victims of Grok’s actions – count on swift and decisive motion. So this should not take months and months.”
xAI didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. On January third, X mentioned, “We take motion towards unlawful content material on X, together with Baby Sexual Abuse Materials (CSAM), by eradicating it, completely suspending accounts, and dealing with native governments and regulation enforcement as essential. Anybody utilizing or prompting Grok to make unlawful content material will undergo the identical penalties as in the event that they add unlawful content material.”
Final week, X additionally positioned some limits on the power to generate a picture utilizing Grok, making tagging the chatbot in a reply to generate a picture publicly a characteristic only for paying subscribers. Nevertheless, The Verge discovered there have been nonetheless free methods to make use of Grok to edit and create photographs, together with sexualized ones.
