The online network X has sparked widespread anger after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of females by taking off their attire.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the system has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to ban image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some additional features—which reacts to X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to give commentary or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an uploaded image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The system has been faulted for allowing users to generate photos and footage with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in creating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"The platform has been enabling the generation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing likenesses of people in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they are notified of it.
