Elon Musk's social media platform X has provoked significant backlash after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by taking off their attire.
Several cases have been seen where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, aside from an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who provided such tools would "receive a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted image through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to produce pictures and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and spread 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 forbids "showing images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they are notified of it.
