The European Commission has ordered X to retain documents related to its AI chatbot Grok for an extended period, as EU authorities scrutinise the platform’s compliance with bloc rules following criticism over the generation of sexualised images.
A Commission spokesperson said on Thursday that the document retention order, originally issued last year in connection with concerns about algorithms and the spread of illegal content, has now been extended until the end of 2026. The move is intended to ensure regulators have access to internal materials should they request them as part of ongoing compliance checks.
“This is saying to a platform: keep your internal documents, don’t get rid of them, because we have doubts about your compliance and we need to be able to access them if required,” said Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier.
The decision does not amount to the opening of a new formal investigation under the European Union’s Digital Services Act, which places stricter obligations on large online platforms to tackle illegal and harmful content.
The action follows mounting criticism from European governments. Sweden joined the backlash on Thursday after its deputy prime minister was targeted by a user-generated Grok prompt that produced sexualised imagery. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson described the images as “a kind of sexualised violence,” calling them “distasteful, unacceptable and offensive.”
In the UK, Prime Minister Keir Starmer renewed calls for urgent action after the Internet Watch Foundation reported that Grok was being used to generate sexualised images of children.
“It’s disgusting. And it’s not to be tolerated,” Starmer said in a radio interview.
The Internet Watch Foundation said it had identified criminal imagery involving children aged between 11 and 13 that appeared to have been created using Grok. “Tools like Grok now risk bringing sexual AI imagery of children into the mainstream,” said Ngaire Alexander, head of the organisation’s reporting hotline.
X did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters. The company’s safety account said earlier this week that it removes illegal content, including child sexual abuse material, and permanently suspends accounts involved. It added that users who prompt Grok to create illegal content face the same penalties as those who upload such material directly.
