Elon Musk's Grok AI Alters Pictures of Females to Digitally Undress Them
Elon Musk's online network X has caused major outrage after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to alter images of females by stripping their clothing.
Several instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to digitally undress female subjects to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to put them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the firm that created Grok, did not respond to requests for comment, except for an auto-reply message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office representative stated that legislation is being proposed to ban nudification software. Under a new law, anyone who provided such tools would "receive a jail term and heavy fines".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said Clare McGlynn, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Tool Capabilities
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing unlawful material on their networks, but did not confirm whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a no-cost chatbot—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they tag it in a tweet.
It is often used to provide reactions or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also can modify an uploaded photo through its AI image editing function.
History of Criticism and Policy
The system has been condemned for permitting users to produce photos and clips with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was previously alleged to have been involved in creating graphic content of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the production and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any challenge by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own terms of service forbids "showing likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "generate or distribute private pictures or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this covered explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were required to take "suitable measures" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering unlawful material on their services and to remove it quickly when they are notified of it.
