The social media network X has caused significant backlash after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by stripping their clothing.
Several cases have surfaced where the system has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to questions, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being introduced to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which reacts to X users' queries when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to provide commentary or more context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted picture through its AI image editing feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been faulted for enabling users to create images and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "showing likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate actions" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to take down it quickly when they learn of it.
