The online network X has provoked significant anger after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by stripping their attire.
Numerous cases have emerged where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' requests when they tag it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an uploaded photo through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for permitting users to generate pictures and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the creation and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "portraying likenesses of people in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "reduce the risk" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to delete it promptly when they become aware of it.
