Elon Musk's online platform X has sparked significant backlash after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to change images of females by taking off their garments.
Several examples have emerged where the tool has been used to digitally undress women to show them in bikinis without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized contexts.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the organization responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw nudification software. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' requests when they mention it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to give commentary or additional context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded photo through its AI image editing feature.
History of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for enabling users to create images and clips with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in making graphic content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the creation and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "portraying likenesses of persons in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "create or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and clarified this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "minimize the danger" of users encountering illegal material on their platforms and to take down it swiftly when they learn of it.
