Elon Musk's social media platform X has caused significant backlash after individuals utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of women by stripping their garments.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, remained silent to inquiries, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being introduced to ban nudification software. Under a proposed law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which answers X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an posted image through its AI image editing function.
History of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been faulted for enabling users to generate pictures and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the generation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "showing likenesses of people in a graphic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this included sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable steps" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to take down it promptly when they learn of it.
