Elon Musk's social media platform X has provoked major backlash after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of women by removing their clothing.
Multiple examples have been seen where the technology has been employed to virtually strip women to make them appear in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to put them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit nudification tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the danger" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' requests when they reference it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or more background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been criticised for permitting users to create images and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "portraying images of persons in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their services and to delete it promptly when they are notified of it.
