Elon Musk's online platform X has caused widespread outrage after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of women by removing their garments.
Multiple cases have emerged where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to questions, other than an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to outlaw image stripping software. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to generate pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "showing images of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "suitable steps" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to take down it promptly when they are notified of it.
