Austin, Texas - Elon Musk blamed critics who "want any excuse for censorship" for growing calls to shut down his Grok AI chatbot over its penchant for deepfake porn and child abuse images.

The far-right billionaire appeared defiant on Friday night despite the outcry over Grok creating sexualized images of people, including children, at X users' request.

Pointing to claims other AI created non-sexualized images of women in bikinis, he wrtoe: "They want any excuse for censorship."

Criticism of X has focused on Grok's production of images of child abuse and manipulation of photographs of real women and girls to remove their clothes, with UK legislators considering a total ban.

But Musk responded by sharing a post from Florida Representative Anna Paulina Luna threatening to sanction both British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and the UK if X was blocked in the country.

On Friday, X appeared to have changed Grok's settings, with the chatbot telling users that only paid subscribers could ask it to manipulate images – a measure than only served to further stoke anger.

Reports also suggested the change only applied to those making requests in reply to other posts. Other ways of editing or creating images, including on a on Grok's own website, remained open.