Elon Musk's online platform X has sparked major outrage after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of females by stripping their attire.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the tool has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit nudification software. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such tools would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was presently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to give reactions or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of alter an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for permitting users to produce photos and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of making graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the generation and sharing of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "depicting likenesses of people in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "suitable steps" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they are notified of it.
