The social media network X has sparked widespread anger after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by removing their clothing.
Numerous cases have emerged where the tool has been used to virtually strip women to render them in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "face a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional features—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted picture through its AI image editing function.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to generate images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of creating sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying likenesses of persons in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "appropriate measures" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.
