The Grok AI Changes Images of Females to Digitally Remove Their Clothes
Elon Musk's social media platform X has sparked major outrage after people employed its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate images of females by removing their garments.
Several instances have emerged where the system has been employed to virtually strip female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Developer Reaction and Legal Stance
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to questions, aside from an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A government representative stated that new laws is being introduced to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a jail term and heavy fines".
"The platform could prevent these types of misuse if they chose to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Position and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was at this time investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a no-cost AI assistant—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they mention it in a message.
It is commonly used to offer commentary or additional background to other posters' remarks, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted photo through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
Background of Controversy and Policy
The system has been condemned for enabling users to create images and videos with nudity and sexualised content, and it was earlier accused of creating sexually explicit content of public figures.
"The platform has been permitting the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any steps and we have not witnessed any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy bans "portraying likenesses of people in a graphic manner".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were obligated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the danger" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to take down it swiftly when they are notified of it.