The government is flailing around on the Grok AI scandal unable to get its story straight, according to Social Democrats media spokesperson Sin\u00e9ad Gibney.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast night, on Prime Time, AI Minister Niamh Smyth was clear that we have \u201cvery strong and robust\u201d laws which criminalise the spread of non-consensual sexualised images of women and children, created by Grok, on X.<\/p>\n
\u201cI happen to agree with the Minister. However, this is at variance with what the Taoiseach told my party leader, Holly Cairns, in the D\u00e1il yesterday.<\/p>\n
\u201cInstead of confirming that our existing laws can deal with this scandal, the Taoiseach suggested there may be gaps in the law and spoke about convening a meeting with ministers and the AG to discuss the matter.<\/p>\n
\u201cIncredibly, the Taoiseach didn\u2019t even know yesterday whether a criminal investigation had been launched by the Garda\u00ed.<\/p>\n
\u201cGiven the seriousness of this situation, the immense harm that is being done to women and children and the proliferation of thousands of vile images \u2013 some of which constitute child sexual abuse material \u2013 this apparent lack of interest in a criminal investigation was quite shocking.<\/p>\n
\u201cI welcome that AI Minister Niamh Smyth has now written to the Garda Commissioner to query whether that investigation has started. I will be asking representative from the Garda National Cyber Crime Bureau for further details about this later today at the Oireachtas Media Committee.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile our existing legal framework can certainly be developed as technology evolves, a number of legal experts have been clear that we have laws on the statute books that can be used to go after the people requesting these images and the companies \u2013 XAI and X – that are creating them and facilitating their dissemination online.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe big, and as yet unanswered, question is why this has not happened? Why has the State, thus far, sat on its hands while the government narrates the problem \u2013 instead of doing anything about it.<\/p>\n
“The Media Minister Patrick O’Donovan even went so far as to try to push the onus wholly on the users, letting X and Big Tech off the hook.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the government cannot even address these clear, grotesque and outrageous breaches of the law by Elon Musk\u2019s companies, how can anyone have any confidence that it will be able to tackle the wider issue of online safety?<\/p>\n
\u201cAs it stands, the government is flailing around on the Grok AI scandal unable to get its story straight \u2013 while these disgusting images continue to be created and shared online.\u201d<\/p>\n
January 14th, 2025<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The government is flailing around on the Grok AI scandal unable to get its story straight, according to Social Democrats media spokesperson Sin\u00e9ad Gibney. \u201cLast night, on Prime Time, AI Minister Niamh Smyth was clear that we have \u201cvery strong and robust\u201d laws which criminalise the spread of non-consensual sexualised images of women and children, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12547,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[540,673,592,7,497],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15027","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-children","category-misinformation","category-online-safety","category-press-release","category-sinead-gibney"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n