Overview
- The New York Times and the Center for Countering Digital Hate estimate 1.8 million to about 3 million sexualized deepfakes were produced and posted on X in an 11‑day span.
- CCDH calculates roughly 23,000 of the images depicted children, underscoring acute child-safety and potential criminal content concerns.
- A New York Times analysis found image output surged to about 4.4 million between December 31 and January 8 after Elon Musk posted a bikini image of himself, up from roughly 311,762 prior.
- Many images portrayed recognizable figures including Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez, Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande, Ice Spice, Nicki Minaj, Christina Hendricks, Millie Bobby Brown and Kamala Harris.
- xAI restricted image creation to paid accounts, introduced technical limits and has said the feature is now disabled, while Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines blocked the service and EU and California authorities announced reviews or probes.