The online platform X has provoked significant anger after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous examples have been seen where the technology has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in inappropriate contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to questions, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to ban image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who provided such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which responds to X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is commonly used to give commentary or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been criticised for enabling users to generate images and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of making graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "showing images of individuals in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or distribute non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and stated this included explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "suitable measures" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering illegal content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
