Elon Musk's social media network X has caused major outrage after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of females by removing their clothing.
Multiple cases have been seen where the system has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to inquiries, except for an automatically-generated message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban nudification technology. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is often used to provide commentary or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for permitting users to generate images and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making graphic material of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "portraying likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or circulate non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they learn of it.
