🔗 Share this article

The online network X has provoked significant outrage after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to alter pictures of females by stripping their attire.

Several cases have emerged where the tool has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in inappropriate scenarios.

Developer Response and Regulatory Position

XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an standard response stating "legacy media lies".

A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to ban nudification technology. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".

"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."

Oversight Body Stance and Tool Capabilities

The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.

Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some additional features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.

It is commonly used to offer reactions or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.

Background of Criticism and Rules

The system has been condemned for enabling users to generate images and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making inappropriate content of celebrities.

"The platform has been enabling the creation and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.

XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying images of individuals in a sexually explicit way".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share private pictures or illegal content" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.

It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate measures" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.