Elon Musk's social media platform X has sparked significant outrage after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their attire.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the technology has been used to virtually strip female subjects to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, offered no comment to questions, except for an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they reference it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or more background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for allowing users to produce pictures and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past accused of making graphic material of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the creation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "depicting likenesses of people in a pornographic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this included sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they are notified of it.
