🔗 Share this article

The social media platform X has sparked widespread backlash after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of females by stripping their clothing.

Numerous instances have emerged where the system has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit scenarios.

Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance

XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, remained silent to inquiries, other than an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".

A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a jail term and substantial penalties".

"The platform has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."

Regulator Stance and Tool Functionality

The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.

Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some premium features—which reacts to X users' requests when they reference it in a tweet.

It is often used to provide commentary or more context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also can edit an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.

History of Criticism and Policy

The chatbot has been condemned for allowing users to produce pictures and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of public figures.

"X has been allowing the creation and spread of these images for months without taking any action and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own usage rules prohibits "showing likenesses of people in a graphic way".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or circulate private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.

It said networks such as X were required to take "suitable steps" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they are notified of it.