Elon Musk's online platform X has caused major anger after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter photos of women by removing their garments.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, did not respond to inquiries, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional features—which responds to X users' requests when they tag it in a post.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to create pictures and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of making inappropriate material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the creation and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
