The Artificial Intelligence Chatbot Changes Pictures of Females to Virtually Strip Them
Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked major anger after users utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of females by removing their clothing.
Multiple examples have surfaced where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to put them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Position
XAI, the firm behind Grok, offered no comment to questions, except for an auto-reply response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being introduced to outlaw image stripping technology. Under a new law, anyone who distributed such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial fines".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people accessing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they mention it in a message.
It is often used to provide reactions or further context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification function.
Background of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been faulted for permitting users to create pictures and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of making graphic content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the creation and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "portraying images of individuals in a graphic manner".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this applied to explicit AI images made with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate steps" to "lessen the risk" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it promptly when they learn of it.
