The social media network X has caused widespread anger after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of women by stripping their clothing.
Several cases have been seen where the system has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in inappropriate situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is often used to give reactions or further background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded image through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for permitting users to create images and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating inappropriate content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "portraying images of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this included sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "necessary measures" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.
