The social media network X has sparked major outrage after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of women by stripping their clothing.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the technology has been employed to digitally undress women to render them in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a new law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which answers X users' requests when they tag it in a message.
It is often used to offer commentary or additional context to other users' comments, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for permitting users to produce pictures and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been enabling the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "depicting likenesses of people in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.
