The online network X has caused major backlash after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of females by removing their garments.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the tool has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to put them in inappropriate scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for permitting users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in making inappropriate material of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "depicting images of individuals in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they become aware of it.
