Elon Musk's online network X has sparked significant anger after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of women by taking off their garments.
Multiple cases have been seen where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to ban image stripping tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a jail term and substantial fines".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of alter an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been condemned for enabling users to create photos and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in making graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the generation and distribution of these images for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing images of individuals in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
