The social media network X has caused major backlash after individuals utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate images of females by taking off their clothing.
Numerous cases have been seen where the system has been employed to virtually strip women to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to questions, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some additional features—which answers X users' requests when they tag it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for allowing users to generate pictures and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "portraying images of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and clarified this included explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.
