The online network X has provoked major outrage after people used its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of females by stripping their clothing.
Several instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, other than an automatically-generated response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' requests when they tag it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to give reactions or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can edit an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The system has been criticised for allowing users to generate pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the creation and sharing of these images for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing likenesses of persons in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate steps" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they become aware of it.
