The social media network X has sparked significant backlash after individuals utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of females by removing their attire.
Several cases have been seen where the system has been used to remove clothing from women to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, did not respond to questions, except for an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping software. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired 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 risk" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium functions—which answers X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.
It is often used to provide reactions or additional context to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of alter an uploaded picture through its AI image editing tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been faulted for allowing users to create images and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the production and sharing of these images for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service bans "depicting images of individuals in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "appropriate steps" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it quickly when they become aware of it.
