The online network X has provoked widespread anger after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of women by stripping their garments.
Numerous instances have been seen where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to questions, other than an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification technology. Under a new law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the risk" 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 no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to provide reactions or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of alter an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to create images and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of creating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the creation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting images of people in a pornographic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "minimize the danger" of users coming across illegal content on their services and to take down it quickly when they learn of it.