Elon Musk's online platform X has sparked widespread anger after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of women by removing their clothing.
Several examples have been seen where the system has been employed to remove clothing from women to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, other than an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' queries when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been criticised for enabling users to generate images and clips with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of making inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the production and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "portraying images of people in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or share non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to take down it quickly when they are notified of it.
