Elon Musk's online platform X has caused significant anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of females by stripping their garments.
Several cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit nudification technology. Under a new law, anyone who provided such technology would "be subject to a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of misuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded photo through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to generate pictures and videos with nudity and sexualised content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "depicting images of persons in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
