Elon Musk's social media network X has sparked significant backlash after people used its AI chatbot Grok to change photos of women by removing their garments.
Multiple cases have surfaced where the system has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw nudification tools. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people accessing illegal content on their platforms, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a tweet.
It is often used to offer reactions or more context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been criticised for allowing users to produce photos and footage with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the creation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have not seen any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "showing likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate non-consensual intimate images or illegal content" and clarified this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "suitable actions" to "reduce the risk" of users encountering illegal content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they are notified of it.
