The online network X has sparked significant outrage after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate photos of women by stripping their attire.
Numerous examples have surfaced where the technology 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 situations.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company that created Grok, offered no comment to questions, aside from an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being proposed to ban image stripping tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these forms of abuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the danger" 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 AI assistant—with some additional features—which answers X users' requests when they mention it in a message.
It is frequently used to give commentary or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been faulted for enabling users to create images and footage with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"X has been permitting the creation and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "depicting images of persons in a pornographic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "minimize the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their services and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
