The Artificial Intelligence Chatbot Modifies Photographs of Females to Virtually Undress Them
The social media platform X has caused significant backlash after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of women by taking off their clothing.
Multiple examples have been seen where the tool has been employed to digitally undress women to make them appear in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, aside from an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that new laws is being proposed to prohibit image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such tools would "receive a jail term and significant fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the risk" of people seeing unlawful material on their services, but did not specify whether it was at this time examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which responds to X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
History of Controversy and Rules
The system has been criticised for allowing users to produce images and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the generation and sharing of these pictures for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying likenesses of individuals in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary measures" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal material on their platforms and to remove it promptly when they learn of it.
