The online platform X has caused major anger after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by taking off their clothing.
Several cases have been seen where the system has been employed to digitally undress women to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, did not respond to inquiries, other than an automatically-generated message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which answers X users' requests when they tag it in a message.
It is often used to provide reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an posted image through its AI image editing tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for allowing users to create photos and footage with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the creation and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "showing likenesses of individuals in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this included explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
