The social media platform X has provoked significant backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by removing their garments.
Several examples have surfaced where the system has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "face a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was presently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is frequently used to give commentary or more background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The system has been faulted for allowing users to produce photos and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously accused of creating graphic content of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "depicting likenesses of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to take down it swiftly when they are notified of it.
