The social media network X has sparked major outrage after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their garments.
Numerous examples have emerged where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Response and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being proposed to ban image stripping software. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' queries when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to offer commentary or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted photo through its AI image editing function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to produce photos and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of making inappropriate material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying images of persons in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering illegal content on their services and to take down it promptly when they become aware of it.
