The social media platform X has caused major backlash after individuals employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of females by taking off their attire.
Numerous instances have surfaced where the technology has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, other than an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being introduced to ban image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' queries when they mention it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or additional background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for allowing users to generate pictures and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of generating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the generation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting likenesses of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this included explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate steps" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.
