Elon Musk's social media platform X has sparked significant backlash after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their clothing.
Numerous cases have been seen where the technology has been used to virtually strip women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit nudification tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who distributed such technology would "receive a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' requests when they reference it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to provide commentary or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to create pictures and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier accused of creating sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the production and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "portraying images of individuals in a pornographic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and stated this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it swiftly when they learn of it.
