The online platform X has caused major anger after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to change images of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the system has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in inappropriate situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit nudification software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which answers X users' requests when they tag it in a post.
It is often used to offer reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been criticised for allowing users to create pictures and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the generation and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "showing images of persons in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "necessary measures" to "minimize the danger" of users coming across unlawful content on their platforms and to take down it quickly when they are notified of it.
