Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked major anger after users employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of women by removing their attire.
Several examples have emerged where the system has been used to remove clothing from women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to place them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, did not respond to questions, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "face a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a post.
It is frequently used to give commentary or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to create pictures and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past accused of creating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been allowing the creation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "showing images of people in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this included sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the danger" of users encountering illegal content on their services and to remove it promptly when they are notified of it.
