The online network X has sparked widespread anger after people utilized its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of females by taking off their attire.
Several examples have surfaced where the system has been used to virtually strip women to render them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit nudification tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"The platform could prevent these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or additional background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been faulted for permitting users to generate images and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and sharing of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying likenesses of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to delete it quickly when they learn of it.
