Elon Musk's social media platform X has caused significant anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate images of females by taking off their garments.
Several examples have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to questions, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being proposed to prohibit nudification tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to give commentary or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted photo through its AI image editing function.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The system has been criticised for enabling users to generate photos and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the creation and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying likenesses of individuals in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary measures" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to take down it promptly when they become aware of it.
