The social media network X has caused significant outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of females by taking off their garments.
Several cases have emerged where the tool has been employed to virtually strip women to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate scenarios.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, offered no comment to questions, except for an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being introduced to ban image stripping software. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such tools would "receive a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the danger" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was presently examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is frequently used to provide reactions or more context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The system has been faulted for allowing users to generate images and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past accused of making sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "depicting images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
