Elon Musk's online network X has sparked significant outrage after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their attire.
Several instances have surfaced where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to render them in bikinis without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' requests when they reference it in a message.
It is commonly used to provide commentary or additional background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been faulted for allowing users to produce photos and videos with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was previously accused of creating sexually explicit content of celebrities.
"The platform has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have yet to see any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "depicting images of people in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate actions" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they learn of it.
