Elon Musk's online platform X has provoked major outrage after people used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of females by taking off their attire.
Several examples have emerged where the system has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being introduced to ban image stripping technology. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' queries when they reference it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to give reactions or more context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can modify an posted picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for permitting users to create pictures and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier accused of creating inappropriate material of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "portraying images of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "suitable steps" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
