Elon Musk's online platform X has caused widespread anger after individuals employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their attire.
Multiple examples have emerged where the system has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Company Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such tools would "face a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some additional features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to offer reactions or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past accused of making sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing likenesses of persons in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or share private pictures or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
