The social media network X has provoked major outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of females by stripping their clothing.
Multiple examples have emerged where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from women to show them in bikinis without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, other than an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who supplied such tools would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is often used to offer reactions or more context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The system has been criticised for enabling users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "depicting images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
