Elon Musk's online platform X has caused major anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their attire.
Several examples have been seen where the tool has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to questions, other than an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being proposed to ban nudification technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "face a jail term and heavy fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some premium functions—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide reactions or further background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to produce images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously accused of creating inappropriate content of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "depicting likenesses of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "suitable steps" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering unlawful content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
