The online platform X has provoked widespread outrage after users used its AI chatbot Grok to alter images of females by stripping their garments.
Several cases have emerged where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis without permission, as well as to insert them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization behind Grok, did not respond to inquiries, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to ban nudification software. Under a proposed law, anyone who provided such tools would "face a jail term and substantial fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing illegal content on their platforms, but did not confirm whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional features—which reacts to X users' prompts when they tag it in a tweet.
It is commonly used to offer reactions or more background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded image through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The system has been criticised for permitting users to create photos and videos with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in creating sexually explicit content of celebrities.
"The platform has been allowing the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "showing likenesses of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their services and to take down it quickly when they are notified of it.
