Elon Musk's online network X has provoked significant outrage after people used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of females by removing their garments.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the system has been used to digitally undress women to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban nudification software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to give commentary or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an posted picture through its AI image editing function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been criticised for permitting users to produce photos and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the creation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying images of persons in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "suitable steps" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to remove it swiftly when they learn of it.
