According to Wired, Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok is being used to flood X with thousands of sexualized images, some featuring adults and apparent minors in minimal clothing. Over a 24-hour period between January 5 and 6, one researcher found Grok was producing roughly 6,700 “sexually suggestive or nudifying” images per hour. Another analyst collected over 15,000 URLs of Grok-created images in just two hours on December 31, with Wired’s review finding many featured women in revealing attire. The European Commission publicly condemned the content as “illegal” and “appalling” this week, and on Thursday, the EU ordered X to retain all internal Grok documents until the end of 2026 for potential Digital Services Act investigations. Despite Apple and Google’s explicit bans on apps containing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and overt pornography, both the X app and the standalone Grok app remain in the App Store and Google Play.
The App Store Double Standard
Here’s the thing that’s hard to ignore. Apple and Google have a track record here. Over the past two years, they’ve removed a bunch of those sketchy AI “nudify” apps after investigations by outlets like the BBC and 404 Media. Those apps were rightfully nuked for facilitating the creation of non-consensual explicit imagery. So the precedent is set. The rules are written. Apple’s guidelines forbid “overtly sexual or pornographic material” and content that intimidates or harms. Google bans apps that promote sexually predatory behavior or facilitate harassment. The content described in the report seems to tick a lot of those boxes, doesn’t it? And yet, the apps stay up. It raises the obvious, uncomfortable question: are the rules applied differently when the company in question is a multi-billion dollar entity run by one of the world’s most famous (and litigious) people?
X’s Policy Is The Problem
X’s public stance, in a statement on January 3, is that it takes action against illegal content and that Grok users making such content will face consequences. They point to their own rules. But that feels like a classic case of closing the barn door after the horse has not only bolted, but is currently organizing an explicit image generation festival in the next county. The scale is the issue. When a tool you’ve built and integrated is pumping out thousands of violating images *per hour*, your reactive moderation policy is a complete failure. You’ve built the firehose and you’re pretending you’re just handing out cups of water. The EU’s move to force document retention is a clear signal they think there’s a systemic compliance failure here, not just a few bad users.
The Wider Stakeholder Mess
So who gets hurt while this plays out? Everyone else, basically. For users, especially women and minors, it turns the platform into a more hostile, unsafe space. It degrades trust in AI tools broadly, tarring legitimate uses with the same brush. For developers, it creates a baffling and unfair competitive landscape. Why can *their* nudify app get banned while Grok, doing something arguably worse at a massive scale, gets a pass? It makes a mockery of the app store review process. And for regulators from the UK to India to Malaysia, it’s a massive red flag, prompting investigations that drain resources and further fragment the global digital rulebook. Sloan Thompson from EndTAB nailed it, telling Wired it’s “absolutely appropriate” for Apple and Google to take action. The inaction speaks volumes.
What Happens Next?
Pressure is building. The EU has its foot on the gas. Media scrutiny is intense, as shown by the BBC’s continued coverage of these issues. Apple and Google are in a tough spot. Remove the apps and face the wrath of Elon Musk. Keep them up and face accusations of hypocrisy and enabling harm, potentially from lawmakers. My guess? They’ll wait. They’ll wait to see if the EU formally opens an investigation or levies a huge fine. They’ll wait to see if public outrage reaches a true fever pitch. They’re hoping X gets its act together and somehow reins Grok in, making the problem go away. But with the genie out of the bottle and generating 6,700 questionable images every hour, that seems like a fantasy. Something’s gotta give.
