Elon Musk's social media platform X has caused major outrage after individuals utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by removing their clothing.
Multiple instances have been seen where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in inappropriate situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being introduced to ban nudification software. Under a proposed law, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to give reactions or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The system has been condemned for permitting users to generate pictures and footage with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier accused of creating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the generation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they become aware of it.
