Elon Musk's online platform X has caused widespread outrage after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of women by taking off their attire.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the technology has been employed to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to questions, other than an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being proposed to ban nudification software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their services, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' prompts when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to provide commentary or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its AI image editing function.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to generate images and videos with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past accused of making graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the creation and sharing of these images for months without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "portraying likenesses of people in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "appropriate measures" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they become aware of it.
