The online platform X has caused major backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of women by removing their clothing.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the technology has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in inappropriate situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban image stripping tools. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the danger" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been condemned for allowing users to produce images and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the generation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "portraying likenesses of individuals in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or share deepfakes or illegal content" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate steps" to "reduce the risk" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
