The social media network X has provoked significant anger after individuals used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter photos of females by taking off their attire.
Multiple cases have emerged where the system has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to offer commentary or more context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for permitting users to generate images and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was previously accused of making sexually explicit content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the generation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "showing images of individuals in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
