Elon Musk's online network X has sparked widespread backlash after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter photos of females by taking off their clothing.
Numerous cases have emerged where the technology has been used to virtually strip women to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, aside from an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw nudification tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such tools would "receive a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to give commentary or additional background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for permitting users to produce photos and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of creating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "depicting images of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or distribute non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this included sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
