The Grok AI Modifies Photographs of Women to Virtually Strip Them
Elon Musk's social media network X has caused major outrage after individuals used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter photos of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous cases have emerged where the tool has been employed to remove clothing from women to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to put them in inappropriate scenarios.
Company Response and Legal Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to requests for comment, aside from an auto-reply response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw nudification software. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "face a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these forms of misuse if they desired to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Regulator Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the danger" of people accessing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was presently examining X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional features—which answers X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is often used to provide commentary or more context to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also able to alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing tool.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The tool has been criticised for allowing users to create photos and footage with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in generating inappropriate material of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the creation and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have yet to see any action by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying images of persons in a pornographic way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images generated with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate measures" to "lessen the danger" of users coming across unlawful material on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
