Elon Musk's online platform X has caused significant outrage after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of women by stripping their clothing.
Multiple instances have been seen where the system has been used to remove clothing from women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who distributed such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' requests when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to provide commentary or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to generate images and footage with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "portraying likenesses of people in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate actions" to "reduce the risk" of users encountering illegal content on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
