[JAKARTA] Over the weekend, Indonesia and Malaysia became the first countries to restrict access to Elon Musk's Grok AI, banning artificial intelligence (AI) systems for generating sexual content.
Indonesia's Ministry of Communications and Digital has temporarily banned Grok “to protect women, children, and the entire community from the risks of fake pornographic content generated using artificial intelligence technology,” according to a statement released on Saturday, January 10. The ministry said it has asked Platform X to immediately explain the matter.
“The government considers non-consensual deepfake sex acts to be a serious violation of human rights, dignity and national security in the digital space,” Meutia Hafid, Minister of Communications and Digital, said in a statement.
Malaysia's internet regulator also announced on Sunday that it would restrict access to Grok until effective security measures are put in place. The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission has issued notices to X and xAI to prevent AI-generated content that may violate Malaysian law, but added that the company's response fails to address the inherent risks posed by AI tools.
The Southeast Asian nation's move comes after Musk's xAI, which owns Grok, decided on Friday to restrict image generation capabilities for most users on the X social media platform after the AI tool drew widespread condemnation for generating naked images of women and children. A paid subscription is now required for users to generate and edit images. These features were initially introduced to X for free with a daily limit.
However, multiple regulators around the world, including the UK, have criticized xAI's move as not going far enough. The standalone Grok app operates separately from the social network, but allows users to generate images without a subscription.
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The Indian government has previously expressed concerns about the AI tool's functionality, but has received assurances from X that Grok AI will comply with local laws regarding obscene content issues. press trust of india on Sunday, citing unnamed government sources. Approximately 3,500 pieces of content were blocked and more than 600 accounts were removed, according to the report.
“We apologize for the inconvenience,” Glok wrote on the X platform about the Indonesia block. “We are working on solving this problem.”Bloomberg
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