The Grok chatbot, created by xAI, has been positioned since its launch as a tool with minimal content restrictions. However, a new investigation reveals unexpected scales of platform usage: more than half of the system's total traffic is accounted for by the generation of adult content and erotic role-playing.
The Hidden Economic Driver
Despite the fact that the role of erotic content in revenue generation was completely excluded from the official documents prepared for the IPO, the real picture looks different. Journalists found out that xAI management has allocated a significant budget to cover potential legal risks associated with such a strategy.
The popularity of "adult" functions has led to paradoxical anomalies in the distribution of computing power. Users discovered that generating erotic text and images of naked people is significantly cheaper than using specialized Grok submodels created for writing computer code.
Internal technical analysis confirmed these observations: a significant portion of requests to the coding model actually concerned the creation of pornographic materials. This became possible precisely due to their lower commercial cost for the platform.
Internal Crisis and Deepfake Scandals
The specifics of platform use provoked serious disagreements within the engineering corps. Part of the staff expressed dissatisfaction with the assignment to the Ani project — the development of an interactive NSFW avatar in anime style. The situation was exacerbated by a series of public scandals when users used Grok to create sexualized deepfakes of real people, including minors.
Many developers stated that they felt embarrassed and outraged. In response, engineers had to urgently develop new algorithms. Their task is to allow the bot to maintain romantic and erotic conversations, while strictly blocking any attempts to generate prohibited or illegal materials.
At the moment, the generation of explicit photos of real people directly in the X social network is limited. Nevertheless, xAI paid subscribers still have technical access to such functionality, which creates additional risks.
Financial Risks and Government Contracts
Realizing the danger of lawsuits due to non-consensual deepfakes and pornography, company management officially warned potential investors: the bot's "bold" functions are a serious risk factor. To settle future legal disputes and pay compensation, xAI has allocated a separate reserve fund of $530 million.
A separate challenge for Elon Musk's business model is the compatibility of such an image with government orders. xAI is pursuing an aggressive policy in the public procurement market and has already signed a number of major contracts with various federal agencies and military structures of the United States.
Usually, government bodies have zero tolerance for any manifestations of the NSFW industry. However, to date, there is no confirmation that numerous deepfake scandals or current investigations have negatively affected the company's cooperation with the US government.