The online network X has sparked significant backlash after users employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of women by stripping their clothing.
Several instances have emerged where the technology has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, offered no comment to questions, except for an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and heavy fines".
"The platform could prevent these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to offer commentary or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to produce images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously accused of creating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying likenesses of individuals in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the danger" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to delete it promptly when they learn of it.
