Elon Musk's social media network X has sparked significant backlash after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their garments.
Several instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to virtually strip women to render them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' requests when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for allowing users to create images and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past accused of making sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the generation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying images of persons in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "suitable steps" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering unlawful content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
