Elon Musk's Artificial Intelligence Chatbot Changes Pictures of Women to Virtually Strip Them
The online network X has sparked widespread backlash after users used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to manipulate photos of females by removing their clothing.
Numerous instances have been seen where the system has been used to remove clothing from women to render them in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, did not respond to questions, aside from an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government official stated that new laws is being brought forward to outlaw nudification tools. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who distributed such tools would "be subject to a prison sentence and significant fines".
"X or Grok could prevent these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Regulator Stance and Platform Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence images.
Grok is a free chatbot—with some additional functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a post.
It is often used to give commentary or further context to other users' comments, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded image through its AI image editing function.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The system has been criticised for permitting users to produce photos and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in creating sexually explicit material of celebrities.
"X has been permitting the creation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any action by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own terms of service prohibits "showing likenesses of individuals in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "create or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and stated this covered sexual deepfakes generated with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "necessary steps" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful content on their services and to take down it swiftly when they learn of it.
