{"id":287802,"date":"2026-01-16T16:30:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T16:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/287802\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T16:30:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T16:30:07","slug":"concerns-remain-around-grok-despite-xs-assurances-says-minister-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/287802\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Concerns remain\u2019 around Grok despite X\u2019s assurances, says Minister \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Minister with responsibility for artificial intelligence<\/a> (AI) has said \u201cconcerns remain\u201d about X\u2019s Grok<\/a> app despite assurances at a meeting with the social media company\u2019s executives of corrective actions.<\/p>\n

Minister of State Niamh Smyth<\/a> said Elon Musk\u2019s<\/a> X told her it has halted the AI model\u2019s ability to remove or reduce clothing on individuals worldwide. The Minister welcomed this and sought assurances this capability would not be introduced, saying such activity \u201cwill not be tolerated\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cConcerns remain regarding Grok as a standalone app, and this is something Government will examine further,\u201d she said in a statement following a meeting with X executives on Friday.<\/p>\n

She said she will continue to closely monitor the situation regarding AI generated explicit imagery and will hold a follow-up meeting with X \u201cin the near future to ensure adequate and enduring protections remain\u201d.<\/p>\n

Earlier, Minister for Media Patrick O\u2019Donovan<\/a> said there may be a legal \u201cloophole\u201d for Artificial Intelligence (AI) models that generate intimate images of women.<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Donovan said it needs to be clarified if Grok, the Elon Musk-owned AI model, has broken the law when creating intimate images of real women without their consent. <\/p>\n

Since 2020, under Coco\u2019s Law, it has been illegal in Ireland to share an intimate image of someone without their consent. The law was designed to include AI-generated images, and the legislation also defines an intimate image as one where someone is depicted in their underwear. <\/p>\n

Such an image would be similar to some of the \u201cnudification\u201d pictures that the AI model Grok has created, by editing images of real women to make it appear that they are in their underwear. But while the law bans sharing of such images it does not appear to criminalise the generation of them.<\/p>\n

Asked if it could be the case that while sharing such images was a crime, generating them was not, Mr O\u2019Donovan said: \u201cIt could be.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is one of the points that we\u2019re going to obviously discuss further with the Minister for Justice, who is the responsible Minister with regard to the legislation that is Coco\u2019s Law,\u201d Mr O\u2019Donovan told RT\u00c9 Radio\u2019s Today with David McCullagh. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a point that needs further clarification.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Donovan added that if AI was used to generate an image of a fictional \u201ccompletely AI-generated person\u201d there may be a legal loophole. \u201cAnd, if there is, that loophole will be closed,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Possession and distribution of child sex-abuse material is illegal in Ireland. Grok has been accused of generating child sex-abuse material, through the undressing function on its app. <\/p>\n

It is understood Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n and the European Commission have been trying to gather digital evidence of any illegal images that may have been created by Grok. <\/p>\n

An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na confirmed this week it is carrying out 200 investigations into alleged child sexual abuse-related images that were generated by Grok. <\/p>\n

Ms Smyth had previously said that she believed X was breaking Irish and European law, because they are \u201cfacilitating\u201d the dissemination of \u201cshocking, shocking, outrageous images\u201d.<\/p>\n

When Ms Smyth\u2019s quotes were played back to him, Mr O\u2019Donovan cited the Garda investigation and said \u201clet\u2019s leave the matter of criminal liability here to the police force of the State\u201d.<\/p>\n

This week, the AI Advisory Council called on the Government<\/a> to use its upcoming presidency of the European Union to advocate for an EU-wide ban on \u201cdeepfakes\u201d \u2013 false, deceptive and harmful images or videos of people that are generated with AI. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Minister with responsibility for artificial intelligence (AI) has said \u201cconcerns remain\u201d about X\u2019s Grok app despite assurances…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287803,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[261],"tags":[291,289,290,18,1647,5066,19,17,76775,36103,82,879],"class_list":{"0":"post-287802","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-elon-musk","13":"tag-grok","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-niamh-smyth","17":"tag-patrick-o-donovan","18":"tag-technology","19":"tag-x"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115905732459345316","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287802\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}