Elon Musk's Grok AI Modifies Images of Females to Virtually Remove Their Clothes
Elon Musk's online platform X has caused significant outrage after individuals employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter pictures of females by taking off their attire.
Several instances have surfaced where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to show them in bikinis without permission, as well as to place them in inappropriate contexts.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company responsible for Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, except for an standard message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping tools. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who provided such tools would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "assess the potential" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently examining X or Grok in relation to artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some paid-for functions—which answers X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is commonly used to provide reactions or additional background to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can alter an uploaded photo through its AI image editing tool.
History of Controversy and Rules
The tool has been condemned for enabling users to create images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the production and distribution of these images for a long time without taking any measures and we have not witnessed any action by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules forbids "showing images of persons in a pornographic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and stated this applied to sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said services such as X were mandated to take "appropriate steps" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering illegal material on their platforms and to take down it swiftly when they are notified of it.
