Elon Musk's online network X has caused major anger after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of females by taking off their attire.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban image stripping technology. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "receive a jail term and significant penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people accessing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was currently examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which answers X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an posted image through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for allowing users to produce pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating inappropriate content of celebrities.
"The platform has been enabling the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "depicting images of persons in a pornographic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate actions" to "reduce the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
