Elon Musk's Artificial Intelligence Chatbot Modifies Pictures of Females to Digitally Undress Them
Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked major backlash after people used its artificial intelligence assistant Grok to change photos of women by taking off their garments.
Numerous cases have been seen where the system has been used to virtually strip women to make them appear in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexualized situations.
Company Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the firm responsible for Grok, remained silent to inquiries, other than an automatically-generated response stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office representative stated that new laws is being brought forward to prohibit image stripping software. Under a new law, anyone who supplied such technology would "receive a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform could prevent these types of misuse if they desired to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Regulator Stance and Platform Capabilities
The communications watchdog Ofcom said platforms must "evaluate the danger" of people viewing unlawful material on their services, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some paid-for features—which reacts to X users' requests when they mention it in a post.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also able to edit an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification feature.
Background of Controversy and Rules
The chatbot has been faulted for permitting users to produce images and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive content, and it was in the past alleged to have been involved in making sexually explicit content of celebrities.
"X has been enabling the generation and sharing of these pictures for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any intervention by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "showing likenesses of people in a sexually explicit way".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or distribute deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "necessary measures" to "reduce the danger" of users viewing unlawful content on their platforms and to remove it quickly when they are notified of it.
