Elon Musk's online platform X has sparked widespread backlash after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of women by removing their garments.
Several instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform could prevent these types of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is often 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 function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to generate images and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the generation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing images of persons in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "suitable steps" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across illegal content on their services and to delete it swiftly when they are notified of it.
