Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked significant outrage after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by taking off their garments.
Multiple instances have emerged where the tool has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw nudification tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing unlawful material 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 features—which responds to X users' queries when they reference it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or further context to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an posted picture through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to produce photos and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the generation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing images of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or distribute non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate actions" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to take down it swiftly when they learn of it.
