Keir Starmer Says ‘All Options Are on the Table’ to Stop Elon Musk’s Grok Creating Deep Fakes of Children

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Keir Starmer’s spokesman on Wednesday insisted that “all options are on the table” to stop Elon Musk’s X site from generating “completely unacceptable” deepfake sexual images of children, but would not commit the UK Government to taking specific direct action against them.

Asked by Byline Times why the Government has not followed through on the Prime Minister’s commitment at the end of last year to ban any apps producing such deep fakes, the Prime Minister’s spokesman said that “we won’t allow” the practice to continue, but would not commit to either implementing a ban, or to stop posting there.

“What we’ve seen on Grok is a disgrace,” the spokesman said.

“It is completely unacceptable. No one should have to go through the ordeal, of seeing intimate deep flakes of themselves online, and we won’t allow the proliferation of these demeaning images.”

Producing sexual deepfakes of children is a crime in the UK.

However, Starmer’s spokesman suggested that it was an issue for the independent media regulator Ofcom to deal with, in the first instance.

“X needs to deal with this urgently” they said.

“And Ofcom has our full backing to take enforcement action wherever firms are failing to protect UK users.

“It already has the power to issue fines of up to billions of pounds and even stop access to a site that is violating the law. 

“And when it comes to keeping people safe online, all options remain on the table.”

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Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has spoken repeatedly in the past about her passion for protecting children from sexual abuse, in relation to child grooming gangs.

However, her spokesman also failed to call for direct action against X.

He told reporters on Wednesday that “we are very clear that what is happening with those Grok deep fakes is absolutely disgusting, and there has to be something done to stop that.”

However, he would not say what that something should be. 

“I’m not about to announce policy here. We haven’t sat down and thought about how we would go about that. But I don’t want it there to be any doubt here in our condemnation of what is going on.”