Elon Musk's online platform X has caused major anger after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their attire.
Several examples have emerged where the system has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to ban image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium functions—which answers X users' requests when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to offer commentary or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for allowing users to create pictures and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making graphic material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the generation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they are notified of it.
