Elon Musk's social media network X has sparked major anger after individuals used its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their clothing.
Several examples have surfaced where the technology has been used to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, remained silent to questions, aside from an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which reacts to X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is frequently used to provide commentary or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can edit an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to generate photos and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the creation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying images of individuals in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to remove it quickly when they become aware of it.
