Elon Musk's social media platform X has provoked widespread outrage after users used its AI chatbot Grok to change images of women by removing their attire.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the tool has been employed to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, except for an standard message stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban image stripping software. Under a proposed law, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "consider the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded image through its AI image editing feature.
History of Criticism and Rules
The system has been criticised for allowing users to produce images and videos with nudity and sexualised material, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the production and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "portraying likenesses of people in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or distribute private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this included sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "suitable measures" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they learn of it.
