Elon Musk's online network X has caused significant backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of females by taking off their attire.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the tool has been employed to virtually strip women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being proposed to outlaw image stripping software. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to give reactions or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can edit an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for enabling users to produce pictures and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of making inappropriate material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "depicting images of persons in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or circulate deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and stated this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to remove it quickly when they become aware of it.
