The online platform X has provoked widespread backlash after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of women by taking off their attire.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in inappropriate situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, other than an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"The platform could prevent these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional features—which answers X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or further background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded picture through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to generate pictures and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting images of people in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or distribute non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their services and to take down it quickly when they become aware of it.
