The social media platform X has provoked widespread outrage after users utilized its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by stripping their garments.
Multiple cases have been seen where the tool has been used to remove clothing from women to show them in bikinis without consent, as well as to put them in sexually explicit contexts.
Developer Response and Legal Position
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw image stripping software. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for features—which responds to X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is commonly used to give commentary or more background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also capable of edit an uploaded image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Criticism and Rules
The tool has been condemned for enabling users to create photos and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was in the past accused of generating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the creation and spread of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "depicting likenesses of people in a pornographic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "necessary steps" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their services and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
