The social media network X has provoked widespread backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of women by removing their garments.
Several instances have been seen where the system has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an automatically-generated message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to ban image stripping software. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium features—which answers X users' prompts when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to give commentary or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded image through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to produce photos and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of generating graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the production and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying likenesses of people in a sexually explicit manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "appropriate steps" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
