Elon Musk's social media platform X has provoked major backlash after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to change images of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, other than an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit image stripping software. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is often used to offer reactions or more background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to generate photos and footage with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "portraying likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "reduce the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to remove it promptly when they are notified of it.
