The social media network X has provoked major anger after people utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by removing their attire.
Multiple instances have emerged where the system has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to inquiries, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such technology would "face a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "assess the danger" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been condemned for allowing users to generate photos and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of creating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the creation and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "showing likenesses of people in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate actions" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
