Elon Musk's online platform X has caused widespread anger after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their attire.
Several examples have emerged where the tool has been employed to digitally undress women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized situations.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional features—which answers X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is frequently used to give reactions or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for allowing users to create pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "depicting likenesses of individuals in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this included sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "minimize the danger" of users coming across illegal content on their platforms and to take down it quickly when they become aware of it.
