The social media platform X has caused widespread outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of females by taking off their clothing.
Multiple instances have emerged where the system has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization that created Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, except for an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some premium functions—which answers X users' queries when they reference it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to give commentary or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to generate images and videos with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of making inappropriate content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting images of individuals in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they become aware of it.
