Elon Musk's online platform X has caused major backlash after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the tool has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a jail term and substantial fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for enabling users to generate pictures and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of creating graphic material of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting likenesses of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate actions" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
