Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked widespread anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate pictures of females by stripping their garments.
Several cases have been seen where the tool has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, except for an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit nudification technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "receive a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"The platform could prevent these forms of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which responds to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to give commentary or further background to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can edit an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been criticised for allowing users to generate pictures and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making sexually explicit material of public figures.
"X has been allowing the production and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "portraying images of individuals in a pornographic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or share deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "suitable measures" to "reduce the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to take down it swiftly when they become aware of it.
