The social media platform X has caused major anger after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous instances have surfaced where the system has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexualized contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being proposed to ban nudification technology. Under a new law, anyone who provided such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their services, but did not specify whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some additional features—which reacts to X users' requests 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 edit an posted image through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been faulted for enabling users to create pictures and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making sexually explicit content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing likenesses of persons in a pornographic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering unlawful content on their services and to delete it promptly when they learn of it.
