The social media platform X has sparked widespread anger after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of females by taking off their attire.
Several examples have surfaced where the system has been used to virtually strip female subjects to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, aside from an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a upcoming law, anyone who supplied such tools would "face a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can edit an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for allowing users to produce photos and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of generating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "portraying likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this included sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "reduce the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
