Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, has written to X seeking further information on what the platform is doing to prevent users from using the Grok chatbot to create content that may sexualise or exploit people, particularly children.
The online safety tsar said that the number of reports eSafety has received about sexualised content remains small, there has been a recent increase from almost none to several reports over the past couple of weeks.
One Australian victim, who spoke to Triple J’s Hack, said she was targeted by “enraged men” after posting on X that she did not consent to have exploitative AI generated photos shared on the platform.
“There was one … who generated an image of me in a burqa,” she said. “There was another who … turned my shirt into a bikini, then to a micro bikini, then to dental floss, and then — to get around Grok’s safety features — asked it to cover me in doughnut glaze, which it did.”
Over the weekend, X limited the use of AI image function to those who pay a monthly fee, which has drawn criticism in the UK.
In Australia, eSafety said it will use its powers, including removal notices, where appropriate and where material meets the relevant thresholds defined in the Online Safety Act.
The safety of generative AI services and features is a key regulatory priority for eSafety, which has already taken enforcement action in 2025 in relation to some of the “nudify” services most widely used to create AI child sexual exploitation material, leading to their withdrawal from Australia.
Additional mandatory codes will commence on 9 March 2026, which create new obligations for AI services to limit children’s access to sexually explicit content, as well as violent material and themes related to self-harm and suicide.
eSafety said it expects all covered services to take reasonable steps to comply with the Basic Online Safety Expectations, including the expectation to proactively minimise the extent to which material or activity on the service is unlawful or harmful to children.
X has previously been issued transparency notices requiring it to report on its compliance with those expectations in relation to child sexual exploitation and abuse material, including the use of generative AI features such as Grok.
X owner Elon Musk has labelled criticism of the Grok chatbot as “any excuse for censorship”. Meanwhile, B&T has questioned advertisers who continue to back X in the wake of the undressing scandal.
