The online platform X has sparked widespread anger after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change pictures of women by stripping their attire.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to remove clothing from women to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Position
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, remained silent to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to ban nudification tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "face a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the potential" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' requests when they tag it in a post.
It is often used to give reactions or additional background to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been condemned for allowing users to produce images and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was previously accused of generating graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the creation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying images of people in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or circulate non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the risk" of users coming across illegal content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.
