The Grok AI Alters Images of Females to Digitally Strip Them
The social media network X has provoked major outrage after people utilized its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous cases have surfaced where the technology has been used to virtually strip female subjects to render them in swimwear without consent, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Company Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being introduced to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of abuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "consider the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but did not confirm whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some paid-for functions—which responds to X users' requests when they reference it in a message.
It is often used to provide commentary or additional context to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of edit an posted photo through its AI image editing feature.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been faulted for enabling users to generate images and videos with explicit content and sexualised content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the production and distribution of these images for months without taking any action and we have not seen any challenge by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "depicting images of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or circulate private pictures or illegal content" and confirmed this included explicit AI images made with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "suitable actions" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their services and to remove it swiftly when they learn of it.
