Malaysian regulators said Tuesday they would take legal action against Elon Musk’s X and xAI over user safety concerns sparked by their in-built artificial intelligence chatbot Grok.
Grok is facing a global backlash for allowing users to create and share sexualised pictures of women and children using simple text prompts.
The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) already suspended access to Grok on Sunday.
It has now appointed solicitors to commence “legal proceedings” against X and xAI, the regulatory body said, without specifying what form the proceedings would take.
Grok is integrated into both the X and xAI platforms.
“This action concerns their failure to ensure user safety in Malaysia in relation to the use of Grok,” the MCMC said.
It said authorities had “identified the misuse of Grok to generate and disseminate harmful content” deemed obscene, sexually explicit and involving non-consensual manipulated images.
“Content allegedly involving women and minors is of serious concern”, violated Malaysian law and undermined the companies’ commitments to safety, the regulator added.
It said it issued notices to X and xAI on January 3 and January 8 ordering the removal of the content but the companies took no action.
It also accused the companies of failing to enforce their own internal policies over harmful content, and said they may still be held liable even if such content was generated by users.
Neighbouring Indonesia on Saturday became the first country to block access to Grok entirely, and the bot’s image creation feature has been limited to paying subscribers in other markets.
European officials and tech campaigners have criticised the latter move, saying it fails to address concerns about sexualised deepfakes.
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