Elon Musk's online platform X has provoked major outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by stripping their garments.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who distributed such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' queries when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to give commentary or further background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for enabling users to produce images and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of making inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing likenesses of persons in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
