Elon Musk's online network X has provoked major backlash after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter pictures of females by taking off their garments.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the tool has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, except for an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to give commentary or additional background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for allowing users to create images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing images of individuals in a pornographic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "necessary measures" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they become aware of it.
