Elon Musk's social media platform X has caused major backlash after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of females by removing their clothing.
Several instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to inquiries, except for an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some additional features—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been faulted for allowing users to produce photos and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the creation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing images of persons in a pornographic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering unlawful content on their services and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
