Elon Musk's social media network X has caused major backlash after users used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of females by taking off their attire.
Multiple instances have been seen where the tool has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a jail term and substantial fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' requests when they reference it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also can modify an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for allowing users to produce pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of generating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the production and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "depicting images of people in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "appropriate steps" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across illegal content on their services and to take down it quickly when they become aware of it.
