{"id":294597,"date":"2026-01-20T21:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T21:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/294597\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T21:14:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T21:14:08","slug":"dublin-city-council-suspends-use-of-x-as-state-agencies-leave-amid-grok-controversy-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/294597\/","title":{"rendered":"Dublin City Council suspends use of X as State agencies leave amid Grok controversy \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dublin City Council<\/a> is to pause posting on X<\/a> pending the outcome of an internal review into its use of the controversial social media<\/a> platform. <\/p>\n

The move applies to the main council account and to subsidiary accounts such as Dublin Fire Brigade<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The local authority is now the latest of a number of organisations to reconsider their relationship with the platform. <\/p>\n

A Green Party<\/a> proposal last week asked the council\u2019s protocol committee to consider no longer issue posts or advertising. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn recent weeks we have seen X breach various laws and international regulators commencing investigations on the platform\u2019s violations,\u201d Cllr Feljin Jose, one of those behind the motion, said of the recent controversy around the X-hosted Grok<\/a> app and its ability to undress people in images<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cDublin City Council, as the State\u2019s largest local authority, has an obligation and duty of care to its citizens. Continuing to publish on a platform that is actively causing harm to individuals, especially children, would be against the council\u2019s core principles,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Party colleague, Cllr Hazel Chu, said: \u201cWe welcome the management\u2019s decision to stop posting on X and to ultimately leave the platform.<\/p>\n

Earlier on Tuesday, the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland<\/a> (SEAI) issued a notice stating it would \u201cno longer be posting updates on this platform\u201d. <\/p>\n

The national agency in charge of green energy<\/a> advice and retrofitting grants left behind almost 23,000 followers. It referred them to its website for news and information about its services and supports. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0State\u2019s EU presidency to include work on disabling non-consensual images and child-sex abuse materialOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

The agency was an infrequent user of the site in recent months. It posted just twice in December 2025, with both posts receiving only two likes.<\/p>\n

An SEAI spokesperson said in response to queries: \u201cWe have no further comment on the decision on X. SEAI will continue to use LinkedIn, Meta, Bluesky and TikTok to support activities to relevant audiences.\u201d<\/p>\n

Solas<\/a>, the training agency of the Department of Further and Higher Education which has 10,600 followers, and Apprenticeship Ireland, the national apprenticeship office, also announced on Tuesday morning that it was no longer posting on the site.<\/p>\n

The move comes as growing numbers of individuals and organisations leave the Elon Musk<\/a>-owned site amid outcry over its Grok AI feature which has been used to digitally undress images of women and children. <\/p>\n

In the D\u00e1il, Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin said he would contact X to request its attendance before a forthcoming session of the Oireachtas Media Committee.<\/p>\n

Committee chairman, Labour\u2019s Alan Kelly, asked the Taoiseach to do so in the wake of the Grok controversy. Google, Meta and TikTok are all due to attend the February 4th meeting, but X declined.<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s Aid Ireland left at the start of the month, saying it had \u201cwatched the increased levels of unchecked hate, misogyny, racism and anti-LGBTI+ content on the platform with growing concern\u201d. <\/p>\n

Swim Ireland and Paralympics Ireland also left the platform in recent days. The National Women\u2019s Council, too, stopped posting over the site\u2019s \u201cpromotion of misogyny, hatred and abuse\u201d. The Irish Refugee Council also posted on Tuesday that it was ceasing posting on the site.<\/p>\n

Other organisations that stopped in the past 10 days include An Taisce, the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties and Green Schools Ireland. Kilkenny County Council stopped posting last month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dublin City Council is to pause posting on X pending the outcome of an internal review into its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294598,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[289,9,10,93790,784,51,18,1647,13,14,18577,5066,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,1722,5765,146492,5,1114,72148,1127,7,8,24442,879],"class_list":{"0":"post-294597","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-artificial-intelligence","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-department-of-further-and-higher-education-research-innovation-and-science","12":"tag-dublin-city-council","13":"tag-dublin-fire-brigade","14":"tag-eire","15":"tag-elon-musk","16":"tag-featured-news","17":"tag-featurednews","18":"tag-green-party","19":"tag-grok","20":"tag-headlines","21":"tag-ie","22":"tag-ireland","23":"tag-latest-news","24":"tag-latestnews","25":"tag-main-news","26":"tag-mainnews","27":"tag-meta","28":"tag-micheal-martin","29":"tag-national-womens-council-of-ireland","30":"tag-news","31":"tag-social-media","32":"tag-solas","33":"tag-sustainable-energy-authority-of-ireland-seai","34":"tag-top-stories","35":"tag-topstories","36":"tag-women-s-aid","37":"tag-x"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294597","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=294597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294597\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294598"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}