Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked significant anger after people utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by removing their clothing.
Several instances have emerged where the system has been used to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in inappropriate contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit image stripping software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted picture through its AI image editing feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for permitting users to produce photos and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making graphic content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting images of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "necessary measures" to "reduce the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they learn of it.
