The social media network X has caused major outrage after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of women by stripping their attire.
Several instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to virtually strip women to show them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw nudification tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a jail term and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional features—which answers X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to provide reactions or further background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The system has been condemned for permitting users to generate images and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in creating graphic material of public figures.
"X has been enabling the creation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying likenesses of persons in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
