Elon Musk's online platform X has sparked significant backlash after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of females by taking off their clothing.
Multiple cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to put them in sexually explicit contexts.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or additional context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The system has been faulted for permitting users to produce photos and clips with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of creating sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "showing likenesses of individuals in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering unlawful content on their services and to remove it quickly when they are notified of it.
