The online network X has sparked significant anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of women by taking off their attire.
Several cases have surfaced where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from women to show them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to inquiries, except for an automatically-generated message stating "legacy media lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to ban nudification software. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a jail term and heavy penalties".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some paid-for features—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to give commentary or additional background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to edit an uploaded image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for enabling users to generate pictures and clips with explicit content and sexualised material, and it was in the past accused of making inappropriate content of public figures.
"The platform 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 intervention by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing likenesses of people in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "create or share private pictures or illegal content" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "suitable measures" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing illegal content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they learn of it.
