Elon Musk's social media network X has sparked major anger after individuals utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of females by removing their garments.
Numerous examples have been seen where the system has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to inquiries, aside from an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform could prevent these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people viewing unlawful material on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' queries when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to offer reactions or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The chatbot has been condemned for enabling users to generate pictures and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "depicting images of people in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the danger" of users viewing unlawful material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
