The online network X has caused widespread outrage after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by removing their clothing.
Numerous cases have been seen where the system has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to ban image stripping tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "face a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to give reactions or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for enabling users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting likenesses of persons in a pornographic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and stated this included explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to take down it promptly when they become aware of it.
