Police have been urged to investigate Elon Musk and X by the Liberal Democrats party amid an explosion of sexualised deepfakes on the social media platform in the last week
Police have been urged to investigate Elon Musk and X amid an explosion of sexualised deepfakes on the social media platform.
Sir Ed Davey, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, said he believes a criminal probe should be opened into the scandal. At a press conference today, he told reporters: “I think is there is a case for a criminal investigation into Elon Musk and his platform. I don’t think any other party is taking this as seriously as we are.”
The UK’s Online Safety Act gives powers to Ofcom to fine, disrupt or switch off access to social media sites that fail to comply with strict guidelines, including protecting children online. Ofcom is currently investigating.
Meanwhile, Sir Ed suggested he was “thinking about” whether it was worth leaving X, when asked why he and his party had not yet done so having been such strident critics of Mr Musk.
He replied: “We have been thinking about it really hard. There’s a real balance to strike here. I think X does need a strong Liberal voice and I’m leader of the Liberal Democrats to give that voice.” In an unfortunate moment, at that point, Sir Ed’s microphone fell off the podium he was stood behind.
READ MORE: People who create vile ‘weapons of abuse’ online face new law
Sir Ed added that the position his party has taken is much “stronger” and that he wants X to be suspended while media regulator Ofcom conducts its investigation into the site. He said: “We’ve said that the whole platform should be suspended pending this investigation of Ofcom.
“Ofcom is investigating it, but nothing’s happening to X in the meantime. No one should be able to access X when such a serious claim and investigation is happening.”
Yesterday, Ofcom launched a formal investigation into the social media platform. The media watchdog said its probe will establish whether X has failed to comply with its legal obligation under the Online Safety Act. If it has, Ofcom can fine X – formerly known as Twitter – up to £18million or up to 10% of its global revenue. It can also impose other business disruption measures, such as requiring payment providers or advertising services to withdraw from the site.
Meanwhile, Technology Secretary Liz Kendall said images made by X’s AI chatbot Grok are “weapons of abuse”. In a statement to the Commons yesterday, she told MPs that a law making it illegal to create or seek to create non-consensual, intimate images will come into force this week.
And she said apps that allow users to create nude fake images of people will be criminalised under the Crime and Policing Bill, which is progressing through Parliament. The new criminal offence will make it illegal for companies to supply tools designed to create non-consensual internet images, in the hopes it will target the problem at its source.
Ms Kendall told MPs: “We’ve seen reports of photos being shared of women in bikinis, tied up and gagged, with bruises, covered in blood, and much, much more. Lives can and have been devastated by this content which is designed to harass, torment and violate people’s dignity. They are not harmless images. They’re weapons of abuse, disproportionately aimed at women and girls, and they are illegal.”
Ms Kendall added that the Government “will of course keep our participation on X under review”, after some MPs called for Labour to stop using the social media platform.
Ofcom last week made “urgent contact” with Musk’s X and xAI over “serious concerns” its AI tool, Grok, has made sexualised images of kids on the platform. It said it was aware of a feature on Grok, a chatbot developed by xAI, that creates undressed images of people and sexualised images of children.
In an update yesterday, an Ofcom spokesman said: “Platforms must protect people in the UK from content that’s illegal in the UK, and we won’t hesitate to investigate where we suspect companies are failing in their duties, especially where there’s a risk of harm to children. We’ll progress this investigation as a matter of the highest priority, while ensuring we follow due process.”
Last week the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), a child sexual abuse watchdog, said its analysts have discovered “criminal imagery” of children aged between 11 and 13 which appears to have been created using Grok. It said it had seen the imagery, including sexualised and topless content of girls, on a dark web forum where users claimed they used Grok to create it.
A post on Grok’s X account earlier this month admitted the company has “identified lapses in safeguards and are urgently fixing them—CSAM (child sexual abuse material) is illegal and prohibited”.
And Musk said: “Anyone using Grok to make illegal content will suffer the same consequences as if they upload illegal content.”
On Friday, X announced Grok will make creating deepfakes a “premium service”, where users must pay to use it. No10 dismissed the response as “an insult to victims of misogyny and sexual violence”, while Ms Kendall likened the approach to “monetising abuse”.
