AI deepfakes could lead to fines and country-wide bans

Summary

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Marketplace Morning Report, January 13, 2026

Episode Theme: The Global Crackdown on AI Deepfakes and Advances in Quantum Computing

Overview

This episode explores the mounting legal and regulatory challenges facing AI-generated deepfakes, particularly those created through Elon Musk’s GROK AI on platform X (formerly Twitter). The conversation covers the potential for steep fines, country-wide bans, and the nuances of what constitutes illegal, AI-generated content. The second major segment highlights a visit to Google’s quantum computing lab in California, showcasing breakthroughs and long-term hopes for quantum technology.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Intensifying Regulatory Pressure on AI Deepfakes

Host: Stuart Clarkson (00:31)
Guest: Olivia Solon, Technology Editor at Bloomberg (01:11)

• Mounting Legal Action Across Countries (00:31–01:49):

  • The UK is expediting a law making non-consensual AI-generated intimate imagery illegal.
  • Malaysia and Indonesia have recently blocked GROK, X’s AI chatbot, and Malaysia is considering additional legal action.
  • Regulators are scrutinizing platforms for failures in removing illicit content.

• Complexity of Defining Illegality (01:11–03:15):

  • The primary concerns focus on child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) and non-consensual intimate imagery ("revenge porn"), both illegal to create and distribute.
  • AI-generated explicit images fall into legal gray areas—images may be suggestive (e.g., people in underwear or bikinis) and unauthorized, but may not meet strict legal definitions.
  • Quote:

    "Putting a kid in a bikini does not make that child sexual exploitation material, however unpalatable you might find that."
    — Olivia Solon (02:56)

• Potential Penalties for Platforms like X (01:49–02:03, 02:03–03:15):

  • The UK’s Ofcom investigation involves a protracted, multi-step process but could end in large fines or service bans.
  • Legal penalties require clear evidence that platforms aren't removing banned material swiftly.

• Why GROK/X Is in the Spotlight (03:15–04:29):

  • GROK’s automatic posting of AI-generated images and a lack of rigorous “guardrails” make it more vulnerable than competitors like ChatGPT or Google Gemini.
  • Elon Musk’s high-profile ownership amplifies regulatory and media attention.
  • Quote:

    "Elon Musk has been explicit that GROK has fewer guardrails... it's more permissive."
    — Olivia Solon (03:34)

  • Solon notes, however, she does not believe political motivations are the key driver:

    "If illegal images are being posted to X, action does need to be taken."
    — Olivia Solon (04:18)

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2. Central Bank Solidarity Amid Fed Investigation (04:34–05:17)

• Central bank leaders (including Christine Lagarde, ECB, and Andrew Bailey, Bank of England) publicly support U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who faces a criminal investigation, emphasizing the importance of central bank independence for economic stability.

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3. Quantum Computing at Google—A Glimpse into the Future

Reporter: Faisal Islam, BBC (05:41)
Interviewees: Hartmut (Google Quantum Lab founder/lead) & Julian Kelly (Senior Director of Hardware)

• Touring the Quantum Lab (05:41–06:57):

  • Faisal Islam visits Google's quantum computing lab in Santa Barbara, introducing listeners to the Willow chip, which embodies the transition from theoretical physics to operational quantum computers.

• Exponential Power Demonstrated (06:57–07:29):

  • The Willow chip recently performed, in minutes, a computation that would take the world’s top supercomputer ten septillion years.
  • Quote:

    "For certain computations, the power of these chips is rather mind boggling... a benchmark... took just a few minutes here... but would have taken ten septillion years... on today's top supercomputer."
    — Hartmut (07:07)

• How it Works—Superconductivity and Extreme Cold (07:29–08:12):

  • Quantum chips use superconducting metals, which function only at extremely low temperatures (“colder than you'd find in outer space”).
  • Demonstration: Julian Kelly pours liquid nitrogen over a clover to illustrate the -200°C environment.

• Twenty-Year Outlook: Quantum’s Promise (08:19–08:49):

  • By 2045, quantum computers might revolutionize drug discovery, food production, and energy solutions.
  • Quote:

    "It will enable us to discover drugs more efficiently... to build technologies that make life more pleasant for all of us."
    — Hartmut (08:42)

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• Olivia Solon on Defining Illegality (02:56):
  “Putting a kid in a bikini does not make that child sexual exploitation material, however unpalatable you might find that.”

• Olivia Solon on GROK’s Permissiveness (03:34):
  “Elon Musk has been explicit that GROK has fewer guardrails... it’s more permissive.”

• Hartmut on Quantum Power (07:07):
  “For certain computations, the power of these chips is rather mind boggling... a benchmark... took just a few minutes here... but would have taken ten septillion years...”

• Julian Kelly on Chip Environment (08:00):
  “It is one of the coldest places in the universe, colder than you’d find in outer space or really anywhere else.”

• Hartmut on Quantum’s Future (08:42):
  “It will enable us to discover drugs more efficiently... to build technologies that make life more pleasant for all of us.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• AI Deepfakes, Legal Challenges, and GROK/X: 00:31–04:29
• Central Bank Leaders Defend Chair Powell: 04:34–05:17
• Google Quantum Lab Tour and Future Vision: 05:41–09:04

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Episode Tone & Language

Throughout, the conversations balance analytical clarity with lay-accessible explanations. Olivia Solon delivers nuanced, data-rich context in a clinical but approachable tone, while Hartmut and Kelly from Google convey technical excitement and optimism about quantum computing’s future. The overall tempo is brisk but clear, suitable for a daily news format.

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This summary provides a comprehensive, timestamped overview of the episode, highlighting core topics and notable insights for listeners seeking an engaging, content-rich recap.

Transcript

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[Stuart Clarkson]

Again against X Y AI deepfakes could lead to fines and countrywide bans Live from the uk, this is the Marketplace Morning Report from the BBC World Service. I'm Stuart Clarkson. Good morning. There's bouncing pressure on Grok, the AI chatbot that's part of Elon Musk's social media platform X. The UK is rushing through a new law this week which will make it illegal to create non consensual intimate images. And other countries, including Malaysia and Indonesia, have blocked access to GROK in the past few days. Well, let's talk to Olivia Solon now. She's a technology editor at Bloomberg based in London. Hi, Olivia. Hi. So there's a lot of pressure on governments around the world to take action. How far do you think this could go?

[Olivia Solon]

These are very serious allegations. Clearly, we're dealing with child sexual exploitation material, which is illegal for platforms to host and distribute. And then there's non consensual intimate imagery, which is colloquially known as revenge porn. And even these types of images, if they are generated by AI in many countries, they're still considered to be illegal to create and to share. If there's enough evidence that XAI is not removing these items as quickly as it should be doing, it could face pretty serious penalties, perhaps starting with fines and then moving through to even blocking the service in certain countries, as we've already seen.

[Stuart Clarkson]

Yeah. And Malaysia, one of those countries, its communication regulator saying today it's going to take legal action against X. We've heard in the UK from the regulator Ofcom, which is going to investigate. So what could the outcome of that be? Big fine for X.

[Olivia Solon]

So Ofcom has a very lengthy process which they keep on sharing with us, which is a sort of, I think it's like a dozen steps and we're at step, like two or three at the moment. But in theory, you know, after, it'll have some back and forth with the company, interrogate whether the company has taken action quickly enough to remove this material, and then ultimately it could issue fines and even block the service in the country. I think the issue here is going to be that most of the images posted to X were not super explicit. They're people in underwear or bikinis and it's being done without people's consent. But they might not meet the bar for illegal material, non consensual intimate image abuse or AI generated csam. There are very specific criteria to meet those thresholds. And I think there has been a little bit of a conflation between pictures of people in bikinis that have been created non consensually, which may potentially meet the bar, but may not, and revenge porn and similarly the same, unfortunately with pictures of kids. Putting a kid in a bikini does not make that child sexual exploitation material, however unpalatable. You might find that.

[Stuart Clarkson]

And there are other tools that use AI to do this kind of thing. The difference with GROK is that it posts them automatically onto the Internet and also it's got a high profile owner in Elon Musk. Has that put them more in the firing line?

[Olivia Solon]

Well, I think there's another aspect we've got to consider which is the guardrails that have been put into grok. And Elon Musk has been explicit that GROK has fewer guardrails. It's more permissive than other models thinking about like ChatGPT and Google's Gemini in terms of creating more risque images. So that has put it in the firing line. Yes. And the kind of automatic distribution platform it has in the shape of X, which is unusual. The other models don't typically immediately publish their outputs. Although I believe SORA does have a standalone app which is OpenAI's video generation model. And then Elon Musk obviously is in the firing line. He's been this, you know, bit of firebrand talking about, about free speech meddling in British politics. So I'm sure the government is happy to engage in a sparring match with him. But I don't believe in this case. This is a politically motivated attack on the platform. If illegal images are being posted to X, action does need to be taken.

[Stuart Clarkson]

Okay, we'll leave it there. Olivia Solon from Bloomberg, thanks for joining us on Marketplace.

[Olivia Solon]

Thank you.

[Stuart Clarkson]

Leaders from some of the world's most prominent central banks have backed Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell as he faces a criminal investigation. The heads of 10 institutions, including Christine Lagarde from the European Central bank and Andrew Bailey from the bank of England, said maintaining independence of central banks is critical for price, financial and economic stability and that Powell has worked with integrity and focus on his mandate at the Fed. Let's do the numbers now. Japan's Nikkei closed up 3.1% to a record high with speculation in Tokyo of a snap election. And shares on the markets in Seoul ended the day 1.5% higher after South Korean tech firm SK Hynix announced a $13 billion plan to build an advanced chip packaging plant. Now, AI has been top of the headlines in recent years, but there's another global race between the world's biggest companies and countries to build the most powerful computers ever seen. Quantum computing, using principles of particle physics, creates machines that can solve problems that ordinary computers can't. The BBC's Faisal Islam's been to Google in Californ to find out more.

[Faisal Islam]

We've just arrived in Santa Barbara, a couple of hours away from Los Angeles, and we're about to visit one of the most important technological developments in the world right now, which is the quantum lab of Google. So we're going to go in and actually have a look at one of the world's first functioning, most advanced quantum computers. Hello.

[Hartmut]

Hi there. I'm Hartmut. I'm the founder and lead of the Qu Lab.

[Julian Kelly]

I'm Julian Kelly.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Yeah.

[Julian Kelly]

Senior director of hardware.

[Faisal Islam]

Well, thanks for showing us around this, this facility, I think it's restricted. Thanks for letting us in.

[Hartmut]

Actually, please come in.

[Faisal Islam]

Okay, so we're coming into a restricted area now and we're starting to see the real deal, the actual conversion of this high theoretical physics into an actual computer.

[Hartmut]

And let's take a look at our latest chip called Willow. And you see it looks a little bit like an Oreo in a way. The chip is actually comprised of two parts. A larger part here, this large silver rectangle, this is our control electronics chip. And the qubits themselves, they sit in this little darker squares.

[Faisal Islam]

But the exponential power of quantum is what you're trying to harness with this chip we're holding here.

[Hartmut]

Yes, for certain computations, the power of these chips is rather mind boggling. So in December we actually ran a benchmark computation on this chip which took just a few minutes here on the Willow chip, but it would have taken ten septillion years. This is the one with 25 zeros on today's top supercomputer.

[Faisal Islam]

So there's a special feature of this process which it happens at extremely low temperatures. And Julian wants to show us just how low that temperature is with some liquid nitrogen.

[Julian Kelly]

Liquid nitrogen? Yeah, it's around minus 200 degrees Celsius or 77 Kelvin. So we've got here, just for example, a nice little Clover, and we can dump some liquid nitrogen onto it.

[Faisal Islam]

And so what's the relevance of the cold to the chip?

[Julian Kelly]

Our chips are superconducting. And when you get certain metals cold, in our case aluminum, they become superconducting, and they have zero resistance. It is one of the coldest places in the universe, colder than you'd find in outer space or really anywhere else.

[Faisal Islam]

Take us 20 years into the future, what are we doing with Quantum computers in 2045?

[Hartmut]

So I think we will use it to help with many problems that humankind has. It will enable us to discover drugs more efficiently. It will help us make food production more efficient.

[Faisal Islam]

Twenty years into the future, what are we doing with Quantum computers in 2045?

[Hartmut]

So I think we will use it to help with many problems that humankind has. It will enable us to discover drugs more efficiently. It will help us make food production more efficient. It will help us with the energy economy, like to produce energy, to transport energy, to store energy, to build technologies that make life more pleasant for all of us.

[Stuart Clarkson]

Faisal is. I'm reporting from California. Our producer is Neil Morrow. Our editor is Naomi Raney. In the uk, I'm Stuart Clarkson with the Marketplace morning report from the BBC World Service.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Hey, everybody, it's Kai Rysdal, the host of Marketplace. It has been a year since the fires here in Los Angeles, and businesses that burned are still struggling.

[Julian Kelly]

You know, I won't lie.

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Hey, maybe, maybe we move the store.

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[Kai Ryssdal]

Hardware store on the ground. Reporting and what the year ahead has in store for business owners still recovering. Listen to Marketplace on your favorite podcast app.