Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked widespread anger after users employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter photos of women by removing their attire.
Multiple cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to render them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, except for an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a post.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been faulted for enabling users to produce photos and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of making sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing likenesses of individuals in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to take down it promptly when they learn of it.
