The social media platform X has caused major anger after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their attire.
Numerous cases have been seen where the system has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which answers X users' requests when they reference it in a post.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been criticised for permitting users to generate pictures and footage with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making graphic material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the creation and distribution of these images for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing likenesses of individuals in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "suitable measures" to "reduce the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
