The social media network X has caused widespread outrage after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by taking off their attire.
Multiple cases have emerged where the technology has been employed to digitally undress women to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit nudification technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some paid-for features—which reacts to X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to offer reactions or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of alter an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to produce images and footage with nudity and sexualised material, and it was previously accused of making sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have not seen any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "portraying images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this included explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they are notified of it.
