Monday 19/January/2026 – 10:07 AM
The Irish Prime Minister, his deputy, and a number of government members are today discussing laws related to sexual images in the wake of the controversy surrounding Elon Musk’s chatbot Grok.
Ireland is considering tightening its photo laws due to Elon Musk’s chatbot
The Minister of State responsible for Artificial Intelligence, Niamh Smith, and Attorney-General, Rosa Vannig, are also scheduled to attend the meeting.
Last month, Grok, which is available as a standalone app but is primarily used on Elon Musk’s social media platform X, began producing sexual images of women and minors without their consent based on user requests.
Some of these images included digitally removing children’s clothing.
Across Europe, politicians took positions opposing the chatbot, and called on “X” and Musk to disable the feature that allows the creation of such images. As for Ireland, the reactions from government officials were less severe.
Irish Information Minister Patrick O’Donovan deleted his X account after facing criticism when he said users, not X, were responsible for the images produced, while a number of other senior politicians deleted or disabled their accounts in response to the controversy.
Some members of the opposition in Ireland demanded that the
Martin noted that he believes there is strict legislation already in place, both at the local and EU level, regarding images of child sexual exploitation.
He continued: “Also keep in mind that X is a very large platform according to the European Union’s definition, and therefore the European Commission is ultimately responsible for such very large platforms,” expecting the European Commission to take action in this regard.
