Elon Musk's online network X has provoked significant anger after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to change images of women by taking off their clothing.
Several instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip women to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, except for an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw nudification technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "face a jail term and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' queries when they reference it in a tweet.
It is often used to give reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded image through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for permitting users to generate pictures and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making graphic material of public figures.
"X has been allowing the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying likenesses of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this included sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "suitable actions" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their services and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
