Elon Musk's social media network X has caused significant backlash after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of females by stripping their attire.
Several examples have surfaced where the technology has been employed to digitally undress women to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the firm that created Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw image stripping software. Under a proposed law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and substantial fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or additional context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Rules
The system has been condemned for permitting users to generate photos and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of making graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "depicting likenesses of people in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "suitable steps" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
