The online platform X has sparked significant backlash after individuals used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous examples have emerged where the technology has been used to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized contexts.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to ban nudification tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who provided such technology would "receive a jail term and heavy penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "consider the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which answers X users' queries when they tag it in a message.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or additional background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its AI image editing function.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been faulted for enabling users to create images and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting likenesses of individuals in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or distribute private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "necessary steps" to "minimize the danger" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to remove it swiftly when they become aware of it.
