Elon Musk's online network X has caused significant anger after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their clothing.
Several instances have surfaced where the technology has been employed to digitally undress female subjects to render them in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being introduced to ban nudification technology. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the danger" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which answers X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to create images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously accused of creating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "portraying images of persons in a graphic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to take down it promptly when they become aware of it.
