The social media platform X has sparked widespread anger after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of females by stripping their clothing.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the system has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit nudification software. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The system has been criticised for permitting users to generate images and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was previously accused of creating inappropriate material of public figures.
"X has been permitting the creation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "portraying images of people in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute private pictures or illegal content" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the risk" of users viewing unlawful content on their services and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.
