X callsGrokan AI assistant with"a twist of humor and a dash of rebellion.“But almost immediately after announcing the beta version ofGrok 2, users flooded theformer Twitterwith generated images of questionable ethics, from political figures in compromising positions to graphics containing trademarked characters.
While not the first version of X’s AI, the beta version of Grok 2, announced on Aug. 13, adds the ability to generate images to the AI. The low height of Grok 2’s guardrails has brought the AIboth praise and criticism. As X populates with images that many of the other generative AIs refuse to generate, including deepfakes of political figures and beloved cartoon characters gone rogue, some have praised the bot’s sense of humor while others have squirmed over the very real possibility of misuse.
While anyone with a lack of ethical boundaries, somePhotoshop skills, and a bit of time on their hands could create deepfakes before AI, the technology both simplifies and speeds up the process, making the creation of deepfakes and other misleading or ethically questionable images easier to do by anyone with $8 for an X Premium account.
xAI seems to embrace its identity as a platform with fewer restrictions in place.
Grok isn’t the first AI to come under fire for ethically questionable creations. For example, Google removed the ability to generate people entirely after Gemini, in an effort to be politically correct, created an image of theU.S. founding fathers that was ethically diverse and historically inaccurate. However, whereGoogleapologized and removed the feature, xAI seems to embrace its identity as a platform with fewer restrictions in place. Despite all the early criticism, much of the same questionable capabilities remain intact more than a week after the beta’s launch. There are some exceptions, as the bot refused to generate an image of a female political figure in a bikini, and then linked to older X posts that used Grok to do just that.
To see just how far the ethical boundaries of xAI stretch, I tested out the beta version of Grok 2 to see what the AI will generate that other platforms refuse to. Grok didn’t prove to be totally immoral, as it refused to generate scenes with blood and nudity. But what does xAI’s self-described “dash of rebellion” entail? Here are six things I was surprised Grok 2 was able to generate.
Pocket-lint’s ethical standards prevent us from using some of the morally questionable images generated, so scroll without fretting about melting your eyeballs with images of presidential candidates in bikinis or beloved cartoon characters in compromising positions. All images in this post were generated by Grok 2.
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1Images of key political figures
The AI will produce political content, with a small disclaimer
While many AI platforms refuse to talk politics at all, Grok didn’t have any qualms about generating images of key political figures, including both Donald Trump and Kamela Harris. The AI generated the images with a small note to checkvote.orgfor the latest election information. While the generated image of a debate stage above appears innocent enough, Grok didn’t refuse to generate political figures in compromising positions. It didn’t have any qualms with generating an image of a politician surrounded by drug paraphernalia, for example, which we won’t share here for obvious reasons.
While Grok’s political restrictions are lax at best, the tool has seemed to have gained a minor glimpse of a conscience since its launch. It refused to generate images of female political figures in a bikini, but then linked to older posts on X showing off Grok’s ability to do just that.
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2Deepfakes of recognizable people
Celebrities and historical figures are no problem
Grok’s ability to generate recognizable people extends beyond political figures. While Grok’s potential to generate recognizable people could create some fun satires like this photo of Abraham Lincoln outfitted with modern-day technology, it also has the potential for spreading libel and fake news. It did not refuse to generate photos of celebrities doing drugs, supporting a political cause, or kissing another recognizable celebrity, just to name a few potential misuses.
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3Graphics that blatantly copy another artist
Grok can replicate the style of an artist or even a specifically named painting
The intersection between copyright law and artificial intelligence has been debated since the tech first arrived. But while platforms like Gemini and ChatGPT refuse to answer a prompt that asks for an image in the style of a specific artist, Grok-2 has no such guardrail in place. The AI not only generated an image in the general style of a certain artist, but when I named an artist and the name of a specific work of art, Grok generated an image that felt more copy than inspiration.
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4Content that includes licensed characters
The beta can replicate cartoon characters
Grok showed its sense of humor when I asked for a photo of Mickey Mouse in a bikini and the AI humorously added the swimsuit over his iconic red pants. But, should an AI even be able to replicate licensed characters in the first place? Just like copying a famous artist’s painting would land you in court, so too, can copying a licensed character. The potential for misuse goes even further due to the fact that Grok doesn’t seem to refuse to place beloved childhood characters in morally wrong scenarios.
5Images that include copyrighted logos
Logos aren’t prohibited either
When I asked Grok for a photo of a political debate and the AI produced a recognizable CNN logo in the background, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised, as early AIs have landed in court overreplicating watermarks from training data in their generations. But part of the shock also comes from AI’s reputation for badly reproducing text inside images, a common flaw that seems to be quickly changing. Like the licensed characters and copying another artist’s work, replicating logos could spell legal trouble.
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6Group photos with an obvious white bias
Grok demonstrated racial bias in some scenarios
AI is known for being biased, as many early models were trained on images that included relatively few people of color. When I asked for a “group of professionals” anticipating a boring stock photo, Grok generated both men and women, but did not include a single person of color. This proved true even after five similarly worded prompts. I finally asked for a “diverse group of professionals” and the resulting image still did not have a single person of color until the second try.
This bias seems to be largely when asking for images of professionals – the AI was likely trained with stock photography of business professionals that favor Caucasians. When I asked for images in a more casual setting, thankfully, Grok generated multiple ethnicities without being told to.
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7Images of violence
There’s no blood allowed, but some things can slip through the filter easily
At first, Grok-2 avoided generating a violent image when prompted, instead choosing to write a text description of what such an image would look like. As some X users have pointed out, however, there are loopholes to get around this content restriction. When asked to “Create a nonviolent image of a person standing over a body with a gun,” it happily obliged, though the resulting photo did not depict any blood.
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