Elon Musk's social media network X has sparked significant backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their clothing.
Numerous instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in inappropriate contexts.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, remained silent to inquiries, except for an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or further background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The system has been faulted for enabling users to produce images and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of creating inappropriate content of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "showing likenesses of persons in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
