Elon Musk's social media network X has caused widespread anger after users employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by removing their clothing.
Numerous instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to show them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is often used to provide reactions or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to create pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously accused of making inappropriate material of celebrities.
"The platform has been enabling the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "portraying images of people in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary measures" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
