Wave of Grok AI fake images of women and girls appalling, says UK minister

The UK technology secretary has called a wave of images of women and children with their clothes digitally removed generated by Elon Musk’s Grok AI “appalling and unacceptable in decent society”.After thousands of intimate deepfakes circulated online, Liz Kendall said X, Musk’s social media platform, needed to “deal with this urgently” and she backed the UK regulator Ofcom to “take any enforcement action it deems necessary”.“We cannot and will not allow the proliferation of these demeaning and degrading images, which are disproportionately aimed at women and girls,” she said. “Make no mistake, the UK will not tolerate the endless proliferation of disgusting and abusive material online. We must all come together to stamp it out

‘I felt violated’: Elon Musk’s AI chatbot crosses a line

Hello, and welcome to TechScape. Happy new year! I hope your 2026 is off to a great start. Today in tech, we are examining the output of Elon Musk’s AI chatbot, Grok, and the US’s ban on foreign drones.Late last week, Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot unleashed a flood of images of women, nude and in very little clothing, both real and imagined, in response to users’ public requests on X, formerly Twitter. Mixed in with the generated images of adults were ones of young girls – children – likewise wearing “minimal clothing”, according to Grok itself

Nvidia CEO reveals new ‘reasoning’ AI tech for self-driving cars

The billionaire boss of the chipmaker Nvidia, Jensen Huang, has unveiled new AI technology that he says will help self-driving cars think like humans to navigate more complex situations.The world’s most valuable company is to roll out the new technology, Alpamayo, which is designed to help self-driving cars handle tricky situations such as sudden roadworks or unusual driver behaviour on the road, rather than just reacting to previous patterns.Nvidia claims Alpamayo will bring chain-of-thought reasoning to self-driving vehicles, combining what the car sees with language-like reasoning.In a speech at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the Nvidia founder and chief executive said: “The ChatGPT moment for physical AI is here, when machines begin to understand, reason and act in the real world. Robotaxis are among the first to benefit

Leading AI expert delays timeline for its possible destruction of humanity

A leading artificial intelligence expert has rolled back his timeline for AI doom, saying it will take longer than he initially predicted for AI systems to be able to code autonomously and thus speed their own development toward superintelligence.Daniel Kokotajlo, a former employee of OpenAI, sparked an energetic debate in April by releasing AI 2027, a scenario that envisions unchecked AI development leading to the creation of a superintelligence, which – after outfoxing world leaders – destroys humanity.The scenario rapidly won admirers and detractors. The US vice-president, JD Vance, appeared to reference AI 2027 in an interview last May when discussing the US’s artificial intelligence arms race with China. Gary Marcus, an emeritus professor of neuroscience at New York University, called the piece a “work of fiction” and various of its conclusions “pure science fiction mumbo jumbo”

AI images of Maduro capture reap millions of views on social media

Minutes after Donald Trump announced a “large-scale strike” against Venezuela early on Saturday morning, false and misleading AI-generated images began flooding social media. There were fake photos of Nicolás Maduro being escorted off a plane by US law enforcement agents, images of jubilant Venezuelans pouring into the streets of Caracas and videos of missiles raining down on the city – all fake.The fabricated content intermixed with real videos and photos of US aircraft flying over the Venezuelan capital and explosions lighting up the dark sky. A lack of verified information about the raid coupled with AI tools’ rapidly advancing capabilities made discerning fact from fiction about the incursion on Caracas difficult.By the time Trump posted a verified photo of Maduro blindfolded, handcuffed and dressed in grey sweatpants aboard the USS Iwo Jima warship, the fake images with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents had already gone viral

Grok AI still being used to digitally undress women and children despite suspension pledge

Degrading images of children and women with their clothes digitally removed by Grok AI continue to be shared on Elon Musk’s X, despite the platform’s commitment to suspend users who generate them.After days of concern over use of the chatbot to alter photographs to create sexualised pictures of real women and children stripped to their underwear without their consent, the UK’s communication’s watchdog, Ofcom, said on Monday that it had made “urgent contact with X and xAI to understand what steps they have taken to comply with their legal duties to protect users in the UK”. Ofcom added that it would assess whether an investigation is necessary based on the company’s response.Meanwhile, politicians and women’s rights campaigners accused the UK government of “dragging its heels” by failing to enact legislation that was passed six months ago making the creation of such intimate images illegal.The trend, which went viral over the new year period, also prompted the European Commission to say on Monday that it was “very seriously” looking into complaints that Grok was being used to generate and disseminate sexually explicit childlike images