Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked major backlash after people utilized its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of women by taking off their clothing.
Several instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the firm behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government representative stated that legislation is being introduced to outlaw nudification technology. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some premium features—which responds to X users' prompts when they reference it in a message.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been faulted for permitting users to produce images and videos with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in making inappropriate content of celebrities.
"X has been allowing the generation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "portraying likenesses of individuals in a pornographic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the risk" of users encountering unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
