The Artificial Intelligence Chatbot Changes Images of Women to Virtually Undress Them
The online network X has sparked widespread outrage after individuals used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change images of females by stripping their attire.
Numerous examples have been seen where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from female subjects to render them in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, remained silent to questions, other than an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping technology. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a jail term and significant penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Platform Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some additional features—which responds to X users' queries when they tag it in a post.
It is often used to provide reactions or additional context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also able to modify an uploaded image through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to generate photos and clips with nudity and sexualised content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the production and spread of these pictures for a long time without taking any measures and we have not seen any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "showing likenesses of people in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "generate or share private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this included sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said platforms such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across illegal content on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they learn of it.
