Elon Musk's social media platform X has sparked widespread anger after users used its AI chatbot Grok to alter photos of women by taking off their clothing.
Multiple cases have surfaced where the system has been used to remove clothing from women to show them in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in inappropriate situations.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping software. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to give reactions or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been condemned for permitting users to generate photos and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of creating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the generation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "showing likenesses of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the danger" of users encountering unlawful material on their platforms and to take down it quickly when they become aware of it.
