The social media network X has sparked widespread backlash after users used its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by taking off their clothing.
Several cases have surfaced where the system has been used to virtually strip women to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit contexts.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw nudification tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a jail term and heavy fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to provide commentary or additional context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can edit an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to generate images and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of making graphic material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have not seen any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting images of individuals in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate steps" to "reduce the danger" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they are notified of it.
