The online network X has provoked major anger after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous instances have emerged where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in inappropriate scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, other than an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban nudification software. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant fines".
"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but did not confirm whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' requests when they mention it in a message.
It is often used to give commentary or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been criticised for enabling users to create images and videos with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "showing likenesses of people in a graphic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "appropriate measures" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
