The online platform X has caused major backlash after people used its AI chatbot Grok to alter photos of women by stripping their attire.
Numerous examples have emerged where the system has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to insert them in inappropriate situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban image stripping tools. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' prompts when they tag it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to give commentary or additional context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded picture through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been faulted for allowing users to produce images and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of generating inappropriate content of public figures.
"X has been enabling the production and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "portraying likenesses of individuals in a sexually explicit way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "necessary actions" to "reduce the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to delete it quickly when they are notified of it.
