The online network X has sparked significant backlash after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their clothing.
Multiple cases have emerged where the technology has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being proposed to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some additional features—which answers X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is often used to offer commentary or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for enabling users to generate images and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier accused of making graphic material of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the generation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "depicting likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this included sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate steps" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.
