The social media network X has caused widespread anger after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by taking off their clothing.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the system has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to place them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, except for an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw nudification software. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and significant penalties".
"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 Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to give reactions or further context to other users' comments, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been criticised for enabling users to create images and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously accused of generating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the generation and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting images of persons in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make 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 "appropriate steps" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
