Elon Musk's online network X has provoked major backlash after individuals used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter photos of women by taking off their clothing.
Numerous examples have been seen where the tool has been used to virtually strip women to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, except for an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban image stripping technology. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also can edit an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "depicting likenesses of individuals in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and stated this included sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
