https://www.scmp.com/rss/523924/feed David Lam is a visiting fellow with the Regional Economic Studies Programme at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute. Formerly, he was managing director of a firm providing crypto and blockchain consulting to regulatory and law enforcement agencies. en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com David Lam David Lam In late December, Grok – the AI model developed by Elon Musk’s company xAI – released a feature that allowed users to generate non-consensual sexualised images of women and children. Within a few weeks, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines took the unusual step of banning Grok after they deemed xAI’s initial mitigations insufficient. The ban was lifted only after xAI placed new restrictions on Grok’s image-generation capabilities. While this episode was resolved, it underscores the risk that... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3344912/southeast-asia-needs-ai-sovereignty-grok-scandal-proved-it?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3344912/southeast-asia-needs-ai-sovereignty-grok-scandal-proved-it?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 01 Mar 2026 04:00:16 +0000 David Lam David Lam One of the cryptocurrency industry’s most prominent figures, Zhao Changpeng, the former CEO of Binance, has claimed that crypto is safer than fiat currency. He made a powerful comparison: only 0.15 per cent of crypto volume is linked to illicit activity, which he said was 30 times less than the 5 per cent rate found in the traditional banking sector. But the reality is quite different and underscores the need for stricter regulation of crypto assets. Based on his claim, Zhao argued that global... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3329454/safer-cash-real-risks-cryptocurrency-poses-southeast-asia?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3329454/safer-cash-real-risks-cryptocurrency-poses-southeast-asia?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Oct 2025 02:30:09 +0000