The Freiburg start-up Black Forest Labs (BFL), once celebrated as a rising star in the AI scene, is currently under massive criticism. With its image generator Flux.1, the company has made negative headlines in recent days. Above all, the partnership with Elon Musk's AI company xAI and the associated shocking images that were spread across social media platforms have caused outrage.
Black Forest Labs quickly made a name for itself in the AI community by developing the image generator Flux.1. The tool was marketed as more powerful and precise than its competitors Dall-E 3 and Midjourney v.6. In collaboration with Elon Musk's xAI, Flux.1 was set to expand the capabilities of the Grok model on the platform X (formerly Twitter).
However, on Wednesday, images created by Flux.1 circulated and caused a global sensation. The depictions ranged from Donald Trump posing with weapons to extremely disturbing scenes with animated figures. Unlike other AI image generators, Grok in combination with Flux.1 seemed to have hardly any limitations in creating such content.
These events now raise serious questions. How could it come to this? Were the necessary safety precautions neglected? The tool, originally considered a leader in precision and creativity, could come under fire for lacking essential filters. Experts like Björn Ommer, Professor of Computer Vision at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, suspect that the high quality of Flux.1 might be due to the absence of such filters.
The founders of Black Forest Labs are not unknown in the industry. Previously, they all worked for the London start-up Stability.AI, which is known for the image generator Stable Diffusion. After their departure, they founded BFL and developed Flux.1, which is heavily based on the Stable Diffusion 3 model.
Alongside the technical debate, the legal and regulatory discussion is also intensifying. The European Commission and British authorities could launch investigations due to potential violations of digital and security-related laws. The situation is particularly explosive due to the connection to Elon Musk, who is known for his controversial views and actions.
Neither Musk nor Black Forest Labs have officially commented on the incidents so far. However, social media is increasingly calling for stricter regulations to prevent similar incidents in the future. The question remains whether BFL can manage the resulting crisis and how this will affect the company's further development.
