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Elon Musk's online platform X has caused major backlash after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to alter photos of females by removing their garments.

Several examples have been seen where the technology has been employed to remove clothing from women to make them appear in bikinis without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.

Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance

XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to questions, other than an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".

A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a upcoming law, anyone who supplied such technology would "face a prison sentence and substantial penalties".

"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."

Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality

The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "assess the potential" of people viewing illegal content on their platforms, but did not specify whether it was presently looking into X or Grok in relation to AI-generated images.

Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which answers X users' queries when they mention it in a post.

It is often used to provide commentary or more context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also able to modify an posted image through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.

Background of Controversy and Rules

The system has been criticised for enabling users to create images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in generating graphic content of public figures.

"X has been enabling the production and distribution of these pictures for a long time without taking any steps and we have not seen any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.

XAI's own usage rules forbids "showing likenesses of people in a pornographic fashion".

In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share deepfakes or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.

It said networks such as X were required to take "necessary steps" to "reduce the danger" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to take down it promptly when they are notified of it.