New Delhi: The European Commission Monday launched a new formal investigation against Elon Musk’s X under the Digital Services Act (DSA) over its AI chatbot Grok’s generation of sexualised deepfake images of women and minors.
In parallel, the Commission extended its ongoing investigation launched in December 2023 into X’s compliance with its recommender systems risk management obligations.
According to a statement, the new investigation will assess whether the company properly assessed and mitigated risks associated with the deployment of Grok’s functionalities into X in the EU.
This includes risks related to the dissemination of illegal content in the EU, such as manipulated sexually explicit images, including content that may amount to child sexual abuse material.
“In Europe, we will not tolerate unthinkable behaviour, such as digital undressing of women and children,” said European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen.
Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, said sexual deepfakes of women and children are a violent, unacceptable form of degradation.
“With this investigation, we will determine whether X has met its legal obligations under the DSA, or whether it treated rights of European citizens – including those of women and children – as collateral damage of its service,” Virkkunen added.
In light of this, the Commission will further investigate whether X complies with its DSA obligations to diligently assess and mitigate systemic risks, including the dissemination of illegal content, negative effects in relation to gender-based violence, and serious negative consequences to physical and mental well-being stemming from deployments of Grok’s functionalities into its platform.
It will also conduct and transmit to the Commission an ad hoc risk assessment report for Grok’s functionalities in the X service with a critical impact on X’s risk profile prior to their deployment.
Separately, the Commission has extended its ongoing formal proceedings opened against X in December 2023 to establish whether X has properly assessed and mitigated all systemic risks, as defined in the DSA, associated with its recommender systems, including the impact of its recently announced switch to a Grok-based recommender system.
“If proven, these failures would constitute infringements of Articles 34(1) and (2), 35(1) and 42(2) of the DSA. The Commission will now carry out an in-depth investigation as a matter of priority. The opening of formal proceedings does not prejudge its outcome,” said the statement.
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