The State-Led Crackdown on Grok and xAI Has Begun

"Kupper, who sponsored Arizona's age verification law, tells WIRED he stuck to the one-third threshold because it's been previously upheld by the United States Supreme Court. He says he's heard estimates that 15 to 25 percent of accounts on X are at least somewhat pornographic, but he's not sure how accurate that is, nor does he think it's "feasible" to analyze such ratios on every website. X did not respond to questions about what percentage of the platform it considers pornographic."

"'I don't think you should have a threshold. It should be: Do you have pornographic material on your site? OK. I'm not saying you have to age verify for your entire site, but for any of the pornographic material, you should have to age verify,' Kupper says. Posts on X that are marked as 'age-restricted adult content' can only be viewed by users who are logged in and over the age of 18, though X generally expects users uploading restricted content to mark it as explicit themselves. WIRED wasn't able to find similar restrictions for pornographic links on the Grok website."

"Kupper says in Arizona's case, individuals would need to bring forth a complaint-for example, if their child was harmed by pornographic material on X-and the court would then have to make X prove that less than one third of its content is pornographic. Nebraska state senator Dave Murman, who spearheaded age verification legislation there, tells WIRED he isn't sure about Grok's independent site but that 'X does not have at least 1/3 of its content sexually inappropriate or harmful to minors.' However, when asked if the state had measured that, he says it hadn't-and isn't aware of any state that"

Determining whether online material is pornographic often relies on percentage thresholds such as the one-third standard upheld by precedent. Estimates that 15–25 percent of accounts on some platforms may be somewhat pornographic are uncertain and difficult to verify across every website. Some lawmakers argue that any pornographic material on a site should require age verification for that material specifically. Platforms may restrict age-marked content to logged-in users over 18 and rely on uploaders to mark explicit posts, while enforcement can depend on individual complaints and court determinations of content proportions.

Read at WIRED