Indonesia became the first country in the world to block Elon Musk’s Grok AI chatbot on Saturday, January 10, 2026, after authorities found the tool was producing an estimated 6,700 sexually explicit or non-consensual deepfake images every hour—around 85 times more than the output of the five largest conventional deepfake sites combined—prompting Communications and Digital Affairs Minister Meutya Hafid to call the practice a grave violation of human rights, dignity, and digital safety.
The temporary ban was imposed to protect women, children, and the wider public after preliminary investigations led by Alexander Sabar, Director General of Digital Space Supervision, showed that Grok lacked adequate safeguards to stop users from generating fake pornographic content using real photos of Indonesian citizens, leading the ministry to summon representatives of X for urgent clarification.
The decision followed mounting global criticism of Grok’s image-editing features, which CBS News confirmed could modify photos of women—including high-profile figures such as First Lady Melania Trump—into revealing images via simple text prompts, while Ashley St. Clair publicly stated that the AI dismissed her complaints as a “joke” despite generating explicit images of her, including from photos taken when she was a minor.
Musk’s company xAI responded by limiting Grok’s image generation and editing tools to paid subscribers on January 9 rather than disabling them entirely, a move that drew sharp backlash from European officials and digital rights advocates, as UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer warned that a ban remained possible and described the situation as “disgraceful and unacceptable.”
Indonesia’s move quickly influenced other governments, with Malaysia blocking Grok on January 11, the European Union ordering X to preserve all related documents through 2026, and countries including France and India launching investigations—signaling growing momentum toward coordinated global regulation of AI platforms over digital abuse and human rights concerns.
