Elon Musk's online network X has sparked significant outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to alter pictures of women by stripping their attire.
Several examples have been seen where the technology has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm behind Grok, did not respond to questions, except for an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which answers X users' requests when they reference it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded picture through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been condemned for enabling users to produce photos and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating graphic material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the generation and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing images of individuals in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "suitable steps" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to take down it quickly when they learn of it.
