Elon Musk's online network X has caused major backlash after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by removing their clothing.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the system has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to render them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.
It is often used to provide reactions or further background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to create images and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of making graphic content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing likenesses of people in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they become aware of it.