Elon Musk's social media platform X has sparked major backlash after individuals utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their attire.
Multiple cases have been seen where the tool has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being proposed to ban image stripping software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.
It is often used to offer commentary or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to produce images and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any action and we have not seen any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying images of persons in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to take down it promptly when they become aware of it.
