The online network X has provoked widespread anger after individuals employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate images of women by taking off their clothing.
Several instances have emerged where the technology has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Company Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a jail term and substantial fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people seeing 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 AI assistant—with some paid-for functions—which answers X users' queries when they reference it in a post.
It is often used to provide commentary or additional context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been criticised for allowing users to create pictures and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past accused of generating inappropriate content of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing images of people in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "suitable actions" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to delete it promptly when they become aware of it.
